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LIGHTS ALONG 
THE LEDGES 

BY 

ELIZABETH STANCY PAYNE / 

Author of 

All the Way by Water and Fathoms Deep 



\ 

Illustrated by 
Ralph Pallen Coleman 


THE PENN PUBLISHING 
COMPANY PHILADELPHIA 
I 9 2 4 


(V|9nTL 



'V'lPiZS 

' U . 


COPYRIGHT 
1924 BY 
THE PENN 
PUBLISHING 
COMPANY 



Lights Along the Ledges 


Manufacturing 

Plant 

Camden, N. J. 


Made in the U. S. A. 


APR 10 *24 

s)C1A777872 

4 ' f f b*** 




To 

MY SON 


Out in the dark that "bound me, 
Shipwrecked, and lost at night— 
Over wide seas I found thee, 
Light! 


Lights Along the Ledges 


CHAPTER I 

The tenth story office windows of Avery, Ames 
and Avery looked out on the harbor and river and 
across to the Jersey hills. Young Tom MacLeod, 
in the window of Mr. Malcolm Avery’s room on a 
June morning, saw the river at its bonniest. Blue 
water sparkling in the sunshine and crisped with 
lines of whitecaps by a clean breeze sweeping up 
across the Bay. Smoke from steamer funnels 
trailing in pennants of amber and pearl. Gay lit¬ 
tle waves slapping the fronts of barges, and tugs 
bouncing along with that suggestion of indefati¬ 
gable busy-ness whatever their struggle with wind 
and tide. 

Weaving a gallant way through the harbor 
traffic, past lumbering craft of the ferries, puffing 
tugs, and majestic liners pushing out to sea, a 
little white yacht was moving up the river. A 
toy it seemed from the high window, its bunting 
5 


6 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


streaming, its brasses agleam in the morning sun. 
Young Tom MacLeod’s eyes followed it until it 
became a speck trailing a ribbon of snowy wake. 

At a desk back in the room old Malcolm Avery, 
senior partner of Avery, Ames and Avery, and 
adviser of the MacLeods for a score of years, 
fidgeted with papers and snapped elastic bands 
over packages of documents. He could not see 
the yacht moving up the river but he could see 
young Tom, and the old lawyer’s eyes were full 
of concern and affection as he waited. 

The lad was thinking it over, of course. Get¬ 
ting hold of himself before he said anything. A 
nasty blow had been dealt him that morning— 
and not a word out of him. Not a protest of in¬ 
dignation; not a whimper of personal panic. But 
young Tom had always been like that, the lawyer 
remembered, from the days he had worn knickers 
and little belted jackets; a self-contained, silent 
sort of lad who stood about, hands in pockets, 
quiet eyes contemplating things—considering, re¬ 
serving opinions. He stood now in the window, 
back to the room and to his father’s old friend, 
his long slenderness in loose summer tweeds, slim 
brown hands behind him holding his malacca 
stick, quiet gray eyes on the river traffic, mouth 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 7 U 

set in such a straight, tight line that the lips were 
invisible. Cliff MacLeod’s boy—to old Malcolm 
Avery still Cliff’s youngster, in spite of young 
Tom’s six and twenty years, and his six feet of 
stature, and the bronzed face already hardening 
into settled contours. A young face showing 
lines cut by unimaginable experiences in France, 
by three years of engineering work in India, by 
the shock of recent bereavement and disaster. 

“ If I could have saved anything, Tom-” 

Old Malcolm Avery broke the long silence. “ You 

know how this makes me-” 

Young Tom MacLeod swung around in the 
window. 

“ It’s the boat, Mr. Avery. That makes me 
feel worst of all. How my father could have 
brought himself to part with the Vagabond I 
can’t see. I’d gladly spare that couple of thou¬ 
sand you seem to have corralled out of the smash 

if you could have kept the Vagabond for me-” 

“ Tom, we couldn’t touch those bonds. Your 
father couldn’t touch ’em. They were registered 
in your name by your mother. She bought one 
on each of the birthdays you were away and 
tucked the bonds in her safe-deposit box along 
with that letter I’ve just given you. 


8 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


“ The yacht,” pointed out the lawyer, “ had to 
go—on that note your father gave-” 

“ But I can’t see,” interrupted young MacLeod, 
“ how he ever came to risk the Vagabond on any 
note. It tells me, plainer than any figures you 
could show, how deep he was in—the poor old 
Pater—before he brought himself to borrow 
money on the Vagabond. She was my mother’s 
gift to him.” 

“I know, Tom. And I know how she loved 
that boat—how happy those two were on the 
yacht. Always like two kids on a holiday. 
Maybe after your mother went your father didn’t 
feel the same about the Vagabond . Maybe 
he-” 

The first flash of emotional feeling that had be¬ 
trayed itself in the young man’s controlled face 
showed now. “I loved the boat too! And my 
mother would have wanted me to have it. He 
must have known that.” It was the only bitter 
word young MacLeod had uttered and for all his 
pluck under the knock-down blow he had received 
that morning something of the weariness and 
strain of his long journey showed now in his face. 
He had come straight from the overland train to 
the lawyer’s office. He had known his home- 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


9 


coming was to a home no longer in existence; that 
his father and his mother were gone—Avery, Ames 
and Avery had cabled that. But only this morn¬ 
ing had he learned that gone also was everything 
else—conditions he had always taken for granted, 
whose stability it would never have occurred to 
him to question. The very foundations of his 
existence seemed to have been swept from beneath 
his feet. 

“ The Vagabond” young Tom MacLeod lifted 
a paper-cutter from the glass top of the desk and 
set it down carefully two inches from its first 
position, the controlled action that had to be 
action of some sort, however carefully controlled, 
revealing as no outburst of speech could the strain 
he was under, “ the Vagabond seemed a part of 
them that I could still have. Something that was 
home. All the way back from India, Mr. Avery, 
I have been planning to go right aboard the yacht. 
I—I meant to sleep aboard to-night.” 

He picked up his hat. 

“ Stay and have lunch with me, Tom. I’d like 
to talk further with you.” The lawyer tried to 
keep the concern out of his voice and his eyes. 
“ I want to hear about your immediate plans. 
Of course you know ”—he put a hand on young 


10 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES. 

Tom’s shoulder—“ Tillie and I would be pleased 
to pieces if you’d spend a bit of time with us. 
Why not bring your luggage up to the house and 
make it your headquarters? Tillie and the girls 
are going down to Long Island next week. You 
could run down there with them and put in July 
at Woodways. The girls would be tickled to 
death-” 

But young MacLeod firmly though courteously 
vetoed this kindly proposal. What he wanted, 
evidently, was to get away. That he had some 
definite plan in mind, and an immediate plan, his 
father’s old friend was sure. Young Tom did not 
look merely sad and disconcerted; there was de¬ 
termination in his gray eyes and in the set of his 
mouth, and in the straight way he carried his 
shoulders as he shook hands and went out that 
argued decisive action of some sort. 

“Ah well, I shall hear from him,” reflected old 
Malcolm Avery, touching the buzzer for his 
stenographer. It was a busy morning and he had 
given most of it to the son of his client and 
friend. “ The lad’s sore now, and hurt to the 
quick. He wants to get by himself and think 
things out. Poor lad—a lonely home-coming for 
him. And a lonely sort of boy always I imagine. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 11 

Those two were wrapped up in each other—amaz¬ 
ing their devotion. But I wonder if the boy 
didn’t miss something that might have helped 
him now. . . . L Wish I could have saved him 
that boat! ” 


CHAPTER II 


Young Tom MacLeod had a very definite and 
immediate plan. It concerned an enterprise, 
however, of far too sentimental—not to say sur¬ 
reptitious—a nature to render advisable its dis¬ 
cussion with any lawyer. 

The “ Owl ” train for Boston was running past 
Bridgeport. It wouldn’t stop until it pulled into 
Back Bay station at breakfast time, and all up 
and down the long succession of Pullmans people 
lay asleep. Only a porter here and there, sliding 
on noiseless boot-soles down a dim passageway be¬ 
tween straight falling curtains, seemed to be 
awake . . . and in lower 14, car 1131, young 
Tom MacLeod. 

Sitting up in his Pullman berth Tom was mak¬ 
ing a list of his assets. 

A magazine was propped on his knee and on 
the magazine was a scrap of old envelope upon 
which with his fountain pen he jotted down cer¬ 
tain items in neat, small letters and figures clear 
as printing; the figures and handwriting of the 
technically trained engineer. 

12 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 13 
JVhat he had jotted down amounted to this: 

Item 2 Thousand-dollar railroad bonds 
worth at the moment, probably 
around eight-fifty. 

Item $368.49 cash, representing re¬ 
mainder of saved up pay. 

Item Plentiful and fairly presentable 
hot weather wardrobe including 
one pith helmet. 

Item Good supply of Class A health 
(now the after-effects of that in¬ 
fernal rheumatic fever were 
nearly over). 

Item A job waiting in September. 

Young Mr. MacLeod searched in the deeps of & 
waistcoat pocket and possessed himself of a stubby 
red pencil with which he drew a roseate line undei 
the last item. After all, it was the asset most 
immediately valuable and heart-warming. 

The electric light over Tom's bent head glim¬ 
mered on his slickly brushed fair hair, untousled 
yet by his pillow, and on the clean line of his 
jaw where it turned under to meet his slim un¬ 
collared throat. That good jaw and his long, well- 
knit frame he got from his mother's side—-New 
England folk from early settlement days. And 
also from them his steady gray eyes that looked 
straight at you, his head turning with them. No 


14 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

oblique glances from young MacLeod’s eyes. 
Frank eyes, with New England shrewdness and 
humor back of the frankness. 

The unconquerable wave in his sternly groomed 
hair and his sensitive, thin-lipped mouth were 
heritage of his artist father. Sensitive lips Tom 
had learned to control—in France, back of that in 
college years, and away back of that in lonely boy 
years that had taught him self-repression. But 
the gray eyes were still young enough to betray 
him. In them sometimes was a wistfulness. 
Not everybody saw it for young Tom MacLeod 
was a pleasant chap to pal with: a good scout 
his men acquaintances averred, a good deal of a 
dear allowed the more exacting sex. 

“ You take a good loaf this summer, MacLeod,” 
his chief had advised when Tom reported at his 
New York office. u You’ve done good work and 
now that you are back home you’ll be wanting to 
breeze round a bit and see the folks; and get into 
tip-top condition — that was a nasty touch of 
fever you had in India. You come here Septem¬ 
ber fifteenth and I’ll have a bridge building job 
for you out in Wyoming. Won’t need you before 
then. In fact don’t want you round. You clear 
out and play a whiled 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 15 

The chief had seen that something back of the 
steadiness in young MacLeod’s eyes. Tough, 
that both of the lad’s parents should have gone 
like that while he was in India! But of course 
the boy had other relatives and hosts of friends. 
And half a dozen girls, probably, eager to wel¬ 
come him home after a three-year absence. He 
wasn’t in shape for hard work. No use tying him 
to an estimating desk in New York through the 
hot weather. He’d be a lot better outdoors, play¬ 
ing round and forgetting his troubles. 

“ Play a while,” Mr. MacLeod was reflecting as 
the train slipped through New Haven and into the 
open sea-indented country beyond. Where the 
dickens was he to play? And with whom? Four 
years of prep school and two years of Tech; and 
then a year in training camp and at the front; and 
then another year of intensified work at Tech; and 
then three years in India . . . not much 

chance to collect play-inclined contemporaries in 
any one place. And Cliff and Celia—thus had his 
parents preferred to be addressed by the big lad 
who made them feel increasingly older—Cliff and 
Celia had established no home in any community 
where a boy could gather playmates. All summer 
aboard their Vagabond, and in winter at Cliff’s 


16 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


studio apartment in town. There had always 
been a shake-down for Tom at the apartment— 
and of course a rousing welcome—when he came 
to them for brief vacations. But not much 
chance in that for the acquiring of youthful play¬ 
mates. 

He had grieved for Cliff and Celia terribly— 
when the news reached him in India. He had 
loved them so much and craved so what they 
could spare to him out of their happiness. The 
one ray of comfort, these lonely months, had been 
the remembrance that the Vagabond still re¬ 
mained to him. It would be sort of a home in 
which those two would always seem near 
him. . . . 

And now even the Vagabond was gone. 

Somebody's traveling clock in the depths of a 
suitcase sounded three muffled strokes. In a few 
hours he would be in Boston. Well, he knew 
what he was going to do in Boston. 

He had made up his mind before leaving Mr. 
Avery's office. The yacht was still at South Bos¬ 
ton where Cliff and Celia had left her at the end of 
a cruise and had been put in the water, Mr. Avery 
had ascertained, ready for the coming of her new 
owner who was at present in Europe on business. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES H 

If Tom MacLeod spent one more night on the old 
boat—the night on board that he had been plan¬ 
ning for and looking forward to and that was so 
specially hard to give up—the new owner of the 
Vagabond need never know about it. And very 
likely wouldn’t have any extreme objection if he 
did. He’d understand, that chap, if he loved 
boats himself. 

And now Celia’s letter, handed to Tom by Mr. 
Avery, made a visit to the yacht imperative. 

Tom spread out the letter on his knee and read 
it again. Then he folded it and put it, with the 
list of his assets, in his pocketbook, switched off 
the electric light, took a look at the landscape 
flitting by and stretched himself out for slum¬ 
ber. 

The heavy, smooth rumble of the train over the 
rails was soothing Tom into drowsiness when 
something startled him wide awake again. A 
small, agile body landed squarely on his face. 
Sharp-nailed little paws dug into his neck. And 
then something small and warm and furry bur¬ 
rowed down under the sheet, squirming against 
Tom’s leg. 

“What the deuce?” ejaculated young Mr. 
MacLeod, springing up in some natural consterna- 


18 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

tion and groping for the switch of the electric 

bulb. 

A series of terrible though smallish growls pro¬ 
ceeded from the burrowing furry thing down by 
his bare toes. It seemed to be turning round and 
round in a sort of incomprehensible frenzy but as 
yet had not offered to bite him. By the time he 
got the light on and the coverlets down the com¬ 
motion had subsided. The turned back sheet re¬ 
vealed a pair of bright eyes peeking out saucily 
at Tom MacLeod. In the nice warm place where 
Tom’s hastily withdrawn feet had been was cud¬ 
dled a small Pekingese dog evidently disposed now 
for a lengthy snooze. 

As Tom and the Peke looked each other in the 
eye a tiny mouth opened to display an incredibly 
pink tongue in the contortions of a deep and sat¬ 
isfied yawn. Tom loved dogs, big or little, but 
when he put out his hand to fondle the mite’s 
head there ensued one of the terrible if tiny 
growls. 

Tom chuckled. "Well, Mr. Sing Low, or 
Growlo, or whatever your name is, I approve your 
taste in picking friends but can’t say I admire 
your disposish. Say it with a smile, old man, 
when you’re asking a favor. Now in about two 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 19 
minutes you and I are going to hear from some¬ 
body. 5 ' 

He reached up and turned off the light and 
then thrusting thumb and forefinger between the 
berth-curtains, he peered through the aperture 
into the darkened aisle. 

No porter, he surmised, would be pressed into 
service to discover an animal smuggled into a 
Pullman. Some distracted and disheveled female 
would presently materialize and young Mr. Mac¬ 
Leod was anticipatively joyous over her un¬ 
doubted state of mind. She wouldn't dare call 
aloud to her pet in a car full of sleeping passen¬ 
gers. And as to which of the quiet berth-curtains 
he lurked behind the poor soul would have no 
notion whatever. 

Right-o, there she was, coming down the aisle 
from the forward end. 

And she was the very prettiest thing young Tom 
MacLeod had ever seen in his life. She had on a 
gorgeous mandarin jacket, coral hued and with 
indigo and gold embroideries. Down the front of 
it two ropes of red-brown hair fell to her waist. 
Below a lacy petticoat or something her little 
bare feet, hastily thrust into high-heeled pumps, 
crept along the aisle. Her small hands were 


20 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

clutched at her breast and her eyes darted this 
way and that, seeking a betraying movement in 
some berth-curtain. Very softly and agitatedly 
she was making, as she approached Tom’s peep¬ 
hole, little murmurous whistling sounds. 

To cut the torture short Mr. MacLeod thrust 
forth a hand with a beckoning finger. She stopped 
short when she glimpsed the hand. (It must 
have looked ghostly enough protruding through 
the curtains with its moving forefinger.) Then 
she advanced and stood just outside the drapery. 

Tom did not dare impose his resonant barytone 
upon the sleeping stillness of the Pullman. He 
grasped the Peke firmly by its middle and despite 
its horrific growls shoved it through the curtains 
and deposited it in the arms of its mistress. 

She caught the little dog to the coral and gold 
embroideries on her breast and stifled its growls 
by the simple expedient of winding one of her 
long braids round and round its head. 

“Oh, thank you,” came her grateful whisper. 
And she tiptoed hastily back to her end of the 
Pullman, 


CHAPTER III 


Now Mr. MacLeod, being six-and-twenty, could 
scarce be expected to accept as completely satis¬ 
fying that warming consciousness of a kind deed 
performed—and to let it go at that. He had to 
see what beauty-by-day was like. 

Maybe, after all, she was thirty-five or forty. 
The light is dim in Pullmans at night and women's 
looks are so deceptive anyhow. 

He was out of his berth long before any 
passenger at the forward end of the car was astir. 
When he returned from the dressing-room, tweeds 
meticulously brushed, tie perfectly adjusted (he 
had even managed to shave) the porter was fuss¬ 
ing over unmade berths at the center of the car 
and the front end was quite shut off from Tom's 
view. They were drawing into South Station 
now and Mr. MacLeod, deciding that the front 
end was the end of ends to alight from, strolled 
with his grip up that way. 

Yes, she was there, making ready herself to 
leave the train. And she was even prettier by 
day in a demure little hat and tailored frock than 

she had been in the coral and gold mandarin 
21 


22 LIGHTS ALONG THE^ LEDGES 

jacket. Her profile against the window: small 
head heavily crowned with chestnut hair, straight 
little back and pretty shoulders from which a 
traveling wrap was slipping, made Tom think of a 
charming French print that had hung in his 
mother's bedroom,—a girl-picture called a Puz¬ 
zled" by an artist named Nicolet. There was 
something in the serious face with slightly lifted, 
questioning gaze and in the expression of the 
brown eyes that was very like “ Puzzled" who 
had always charmed his young imagination. 

This girl did not look so much puzzled, how¬ 
ever, as anxious. She pretended to be very busy 
adjusting her bags and her gloves but she kept 
sending furtive glances through the window at the 
platform outside, as though she dreaded rather 
than hoped to see somebody, come to meet her 
train. 

Sing Low, or Growlo, was not in evidence 
though a doggish looking basket of leather- 
trimmed wicker seemed to hint at his nearness. 
There was another bag, a big black leather suit¬ 
case, and on a leather-framed tag attached to its 
handle Mr. MacLeod, by stooping nonchalantly 
to flick a speck of dust from his trouser-leg, read 
the name Hageboom. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 23 


Not much of a name for so lovely a being—but 
of course feminine names can be changed. . . . 

Tom was standing at the end of a line of people 
waiting to leave the car and his position was, 
through strategic manoeuvring, beside the young 
lady’s section. He wondered if it would do to 
make concerned inquiry about last night’s run¬ 
away but decided against the impulse. There was 
something of reserve about Growlo’s young mis¬ 
tress that rendered too dangerous any informal 
pleasantry of that sort. After all, she hadn’t had 
a glimpse of him, Tom remembered. Except for 
a pajama-cuffed hand emerging from a curtain. 
And she didn’t seem to have the least curiosity 
about him, or his hand, or about any possible 
masculine befriender of Growlo among the several 
gentlemen waiting in the line. She was far too 
busy scanning faces on the platform outside. 

The porter came and got her suitcase (the 
doggish basket she carefully retained in her own 
possession); and Tom, just ahead of her as she 
stepped out of the car, heard her low-spoken direc¬ 
tion to a red-cap. 

“ Please put me in a taxi that will take me to 
the Touraine Hotel.” 

Tom had cherished an idea of stopping at the 


24 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


Copley Plaza but after all, he decided, the Tou- 
raine was a good place; he had always liked the 
grill there and that homelike lounge with the big 
fireplace. So he left the subway at Boylston 
Street station and stepped across to the Tou- 
raine. 

But though he lingered in the homelike lounge 
for an hour neither Growlo nor Miss Puzzled put 
in an appearance. Tom was sure they could not 
have arrived ahead of him for no Hageboom had 
registered at the desk. Just above his own name 
was scrawled E. B. Jameson , Coxsackie, N . F.— 
the first arrival of the morning and presumably a 
traveling salesman. 

However, Tom took a chance. He drew the 
room clerk’s attention to the name. 

“ Tall, red-headed chap? ” asked Mr. MacLeod 
genially. “ I knew an Ed Jameson from Cox¬ 
sackie—went to prep school with him.” 

The clerk favored Tom with a stony stare. 
“ Not the type at all. Guess it isn’t your friend.” 

All that day the room clerk watched Tom rather 
sharply as he went in and out, but the dainty Miss 
Hageboom never appeared. 

Tom’s special business in Boston could not be 
transacted until evening and time hung a bit 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 25 


heavy on his hands. He read the papers in the 
lounge all morning—keeping one eye on the eleva¬ 
tor doors, and lunched twice, in the main restau¬ 
rant and also down in the grill. Tom MacLeod, 
you understand, was not the type of young man 
who hangs about hotel lobbies seeking flirtatious 
adventure, but he was a young fellow at a loose 
end and desperately lonely. His encounter with 
the brown-eyed owner of Growlo was the pleasant¬ 
est thing that had happened to him since his re¬ 
turn to American shores. He thought he should 
like little Miss Puzzled if he knew her, and 
though he hadn’t much hope of knowing her there 
would be certain comfort to his loneliness in see¬ 
ing her again. 

But after lunch he gave it up and went to his 
room to look over his mother’s letter. He had 
read it several times since leaving Mr. Avery’s 
office. Now he got it out again and was able to 
go through it without that choking tightness in 
his throat and blur of tears before his eyes. 

It had been written almost two years ago and it 
was the kind of letter a mother would write, know¬ 
ing that she would never see her boy again and 
wanting to give him something to carry on with 
through the years. She ought to have been more 


26 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

to him, she said. She and Cliff had been too 
absorbed in each other. They had never meant 
to let Tom feel neglected, but now she was afraid, 
perhaps, sometimes he had. She had realized, 
those months while he was in France, how much 
more she and Cliff might have been to him. And 
now he was in India and she was going to leave 
Cliff and him—and she saw too late how close the 
three of them ought to have been. 

She asked Tom to forgive her—he, her boy who 
was so close to her heart in these last days. She 
wanted him to know how she loved him. And 
how she believed in him—how safe she felt about 
his future. 

And then it was Cliff she spoke of. Cliff com¬ 
mitted to the son’s most tender care. Tom must 
try to be to Cliff what she could not be any more: 
a strength and companion and playmate. Cliff 
must not be allowed to go under. . . . 

Tom MacLeod let the sheets fall from his hands. 
Cliff had gone under. Poor Cliff, happy-go-lucky 
artist, trying to play at big business with the for¬ 
tune left in his care; seeking distraction from 
loneliness and making a disastrous muddle of 
things. Tom could not bring himself to blame 
Cliff MacLeod too bitterly. The very irresponsi- 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 27 

bility of that blithe spirit had called and held all 
the rich tenderness of Celia’s love. 

At the end of her letter to Tom this postscript: 

I leave a message for yon on the Vagabond. Look 
for it the moment yon return home. I cannot leave 
papers concerning this matter in my safe-deposit box, 
for it would hurt Cliff too much to think I had busi¬ 
ness, or any part of my life, not shared with him. 

You will find the message behind a panel on the 
port side of the aft cabin. Cliff hated my cutting a 
swastika in that panel, but I did it to show you the 
place. 

I cannot imagine either you or Cliff selling the 
Vagabond. But if such a thing should happen, do 
not let the yacht go, Tom, until you have secured 
what I have put behind that panel. This is vitally 
important. Your mother, C. E. MacLeod. 

Thus it will be seen what imperative business 
young Tom MacLeod had in Boston. The Vaga¬ 
bond had been sold. Before the new owner took 
possession Tom must obtain that message of his 
mother’s. 

Very probably whoever owned the boat would 
make no more objection to the search for a 
mother’s message than he would to a sentimental 
last night on board. But if even Cliff MacLeod 
could not have knowledge of Celia’s secret much 
less must any stranger be told of it. No, the 
search must be made without permission of any¬ 
body. Tom had his own keys for the cabin doors 


28 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 
and if the yacht was unoccupied he could slip 
aboard after dark and be off at dawn. 

It is not to be denied that this undertaking 
offered an element of attractive adventure. Tom 
was only twenty-six and he had dreamed all the 
way across an ocean and a continent of coming 
home to the old boat. Quite apart from the mat¬ 
ter of Celia’s message was an obstinate determi¬ 
nation to have one more night aboard. If fate 
had robbed him of everything else it wasn’t going 
to rob him of that home-coming to the Vagabond. 

There was not a plank in the Vagabond's hull 
that Tom did not know; nor a nut in her engine. 
By the time he reached seventeen he had been 
able to handle the yacht as well as his skipper 
father. Probably because he spent so many hours 
with old Saunders. Up forward “ talking boat ” 
with old Saunders while those two were together 
in the cockpit; helping old Saunders clean the 
engine while the two were adventuring ashore; 
making toast on the galley stove for old Saunders 
who let Tom carry breakfast trays to the aft cabin 
where Cliff and Celia had coffee luxuriously in 
their bunks. To the lonely boy the Vagabond 
had meant more than Cliff or Celia ever guessed. 
He had always dreamed that when he grew up and 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 29 

they could accept him on their own level—when 
he could understand those whimsical things Cliff 
said to her with lifted eyebrow, and those gay 
side-glances of hers which seemed to say so much 
to Cliff that Tom couldn’t comprehend—that he 
would be one of them, on board, and not a sort of 
visitor. Now they were gone. Happy together 
again somewhere, and without him. . . . 

But if only Cliff had spared him the Vagabond! 

At any rate he was going to have his one night 
aboard and nobody was ever going to know about 
it. 

After an early dinner, armed with an electric 
torch, a screw-driver and a chisel (in case tools on 
the yacht should not be available) he took the 
subway for South Boston. 

There were many cruisers and yawls in the basin 
but this was not a yachting harbor and few of the 
boats were in commission. Tom’s searching eye 
located the Vagabond lying just off the shipyard 
and for a moment he felt bitter disappointment 
for he thought the cabin was lighted up. Then he 
realized it was only a reflection of the setting sun 
on closed ports. But that effect of lighted win¬ 
dows gave him an eerie sensation of being again 
a schoolboy, on his way to join Cliff and Celia for 


30 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

a brief vacation on board the yacht. He would 
find them lounging in the cockpit, his mother gay 
and pretty and tanned in her white boat frock 
and his father in flannels, pipe in mouth and with 
yachting cap jauntily aslant. So joyous he al¬ 
ways found them, so contented to be on the 
Vagabond together, anchoring where they listed— 
Gypsies reveling in their roaming. 

Tom made careful note of the yacht’s position 
in order to find her later without difficulty. It 
was hard to wait until dark, now that he was here. 
The wind-tumbled water, the rocking boats, the 
salty, tarry tang of the air as he stood on the long 
wharf set something in him astir—the born sea- 
lover’s thrill to the call of wide spaces. Not a 
whole quarter of the fortune Cliff MacLeod had 
let slip through his fingers could have tempted 
young Tom at this minute to abandon his project 
of rowing out over that water and climbing aboard 
the yacht. 

When darkness came he had to wait a bit longer 
until a slim moon had slipped down behind the 
west. Then in his hired dinghy he rowed out 
across the ink-black harbor. Little waves slapped 
against the bow and the night wind ruffled his 
hair. He had stowed his straw hat under a thwart 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 31 


with some groceries he had picked up ashore: a 
bottle of milk, a loaf of bread, a slab of paper- 
wrapped butter and a bag of peaches. He in¬ 
tended to breakfast like a king and without build¬ 
ing any betraying fire in the galley stove. He 
knew there were blankets aboard and he would go 
to sleep listening to the ripple and swish of water 
alongside his bunk. And before breakfast he 
would slip overboard for a swim. 

He had to pass many lighted boats from which 
came sounds of gay voices and the clatter of crock¬ 
ery in galleys and he drew from his pocket a cloth 
sport-cap and drew its visor down over his eyes. 
He wasn’t going to be recognized as young Mac¬ 
Leod snooping round to gaze at the boat that was 
no longer his. Maudlin sentiment it would seem 
to anyone who spotted him. Well, so it was, 
perhaps—but of course he had a purpose. And a 
purpose nobody must know about. 

The Vagabond, when he drew near, had every 
evidence of being an abandoned boat. No awn¬ 
ings were up. Ports and skylights were closed. 
An anchor lantern, probably brought out by a 
caretaker, swung on the signal mast abaft the 
bridge. The tender in its canvas covering hung at 
the davits over the deck house. 


32 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


Then, rowing around under the stern, Tom’s 
dinghy bumped into something. 

A rowboat trailing! 

This gave the adventurer pause. If nobody was 
on board why a tender trailing? Not the Vaga¬ 
bond's tender, for that hung, canvas-swathed, in 
the davits. This was a disreputable old flat- 
bottomed harbor dinghy and a pair of oars lay 
in it. 

Sneak thieves? Or maybe some cheeky fellow 
camping out luxuriously o’ nights on an unoc¬ 
cupied boat. Tom reconnoitred. 

He rowed around the yacht several times, his 
oar blades dipping noiselessly. A long twenty 
minutes he held his dinghy close under the cabin 
ports. Not a sound from within the boat. Not a 
movement. Not a snore! 

It wasn’t likely that anybody would go to sleep 
in a small cabin this sultry June night with doors 
and ports tight shut. And above the crew’s cubby 
forward the skylight was shut. No, there was 
nobody aboard. Very probably the old rowboat 
had been trailing astern when the Vagabond was 
hauled out here and then forgotten, or the care¬ 
taker might have come out in it and then gone off 
in somebody’s launch. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 33 

Tom pulled his dinghy alongside, made it fast 
and climbed nimbly to the deck. He tiptoed aft, 
along by the deck house, to the cockpit. There 
he got out his electric torch, flashed on the light 
and inserted his key in the lock of the cabin door. 

And then he felt the knob turn under his hand! 

The door was jerked open from within. 

“ Wh-what do you w-want? ” demanded a very 
young, very wrathful and very scared feminine 
voice. 

Framed in the doorway, in the full glare of 
Tom’s torch stood a girl in a coral and gold 
mandarin coat. 

It was the girl of the Pullman. 


CHAPTER IV 


Tom, behind the electric torch, was not visible 
to the girl in the doorway as she was to him, 
standing in the full stream of light. It glimmered 
on her hair, falling in two long chestnut braids 
over her shoulders, and revealed her eyes, deep 
brown and startled, and her white throat where a 
little pulse beat, witness to the terrified thumping 
of her heart. 

“ Wh-what do you want? ” she repeated, and 
Tom who had taken an involuntary step backward 
at the opening of the door, saw that in one of her 
little hands she clutched a revolver. 

It was no time for fooling, young Mr. MacLeod 
realized that. With his electric torch and his cloth 
cap dragged over his eyes he must be an extremely 
unprepossessing figure to a youthful female out in 
the middle of a harbor on a dark night. He low¬ 
ered the torch, its radius of light playing over the 
girl's little bare feet on the door-sill, and whipped 
off his cap. He hastened to explain, not very 
coherently for he was a good deal upset himself. 

“ Frightfully sorry. Beg your pardon I'm sure. 
Please don't be frightened. Just came out to have 
34 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 35 


a look at the Vagabond. Our boat, you 
know-” 

“ I beg your pardon,” cut in the young lady 
sharply. “ My boat.” 

“ Oh,” said Tom MacLeod. “ Oh. . . 

“ And I'll thank you to take yourself off it— 
whoever you are. Quick now—no nonsense. My 
—my husband is asleep in here. And—and I've 
a dog.” 

Indeed portentous sounds that seemed to come 
muffled through a bunk blanket threatened the 
immediate onslaught of Growlo. 

Young Tom in dire confusion and embarrass¬ 
ment waited not on the order of his going, he 
went—around the corner of the deck house and 
into his dinghy which all but capsized under his 
flying leap. 

She was married. 

Tragic enough to lose both one’s parents and all 
one's income and to be sickeningly disappointed 
about returning to the old boat for one last 
glimpse of home and baffled in one’s intention to 
search behind the panel . . . but she was 

married. That seemed to put the final climax on 
calamity. 

Of course, traveling to Boston (he had thought 


36 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

it odd that one so lovely and so young should be 
taking a night journey alone) she had been com¬ 
ing to join her husband. The new owner of the 
Vagabond , a Buffalo man Mr. Avery had men¬ 
tioned, must have returned from that business 
trip to Europe; he had run over to Boston to look 
at his new boat and then sent for his wife to join 
him. 

Tom blamed himself for not making inquiry at 
the shipyard before setting out in a hired row¬ 
boat with an electric torch and burglarish head- 
gear. Suppose it had been Husband who had 
heard him sneaking round—and opened that door! 
A nice mess things would have been in. Husband 
was probably a big husky middle-westerner who 
wouldn’t have waited to ask intruders what they 
wanted but would have pitched them right over¬ 
board. And quite properly too—breaking into 
his yacht that way. 

Well, what next? . . . She was married. 
The Vagabond was forever denied him—unless he 
could make enough money, plus the two railroad 
bonds to buy the yacht back when this Whosis 
from Buffalo got tired of it. He must wait for 
that, and meanwhile it wasn’t likely that anybody 
would think of ripping out the panels in the cabin. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 37 

Some bally outsider might paint that dusky wal¬ 
nut over with tinted enamel but there wasn't a 
chance in a million the paneling itself would be 
tampered with. 

Tom rowed sulkily back between lines of an¬ 
chored boats. Suddenly, close by, he heard a girl 
laughing. He glanced up at a little power cruiser 
he was passing. The girl was hanging idly over 
the cockpit rail, laughing at some remark of an 
unseen person inside the cabin. A ray of light 
from the open door happened to touch Tom's 
uplifted face. 

“ Why it can't be—it is. It's Tom MacLeod! " 

Young Tom felt as joyous about the meeting 
as she seemed to be. It was good at this lonely 
moment to see the face of a friend. 

“Sue Hamlin," he hailed delightedly, pulling 
in toward the landing steps of the cruiser. “ By 
all that's beatific, what are you doing here? 
Where's old Bob? " 

In two minutes he was aboard the little cruiser, 
shaking hands and exchanging greetings. Bob 
Hamlin had been his pal at prep school and he had 
known Sue Burroughs when her brother's yacht, 
the Sorceress , had hobnobbed with the Vagabond 
at week-end anchorages. 


38 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

“And now behold the Hamlin yacht,” Mr. 
Hamlin proudly showed the guest around (it only 
took ten minutes). “I can run her too,” in¬ 
formed Mr. Hamlin chestily. “ Sue trained me in 
last summer on a houseboat. She can't fling 
‘lubber' at me any more. I’ve passed. You 
ought to hear me reel off nautical terms.” 

To these good friends Tom confided his scheme 
for a sentimental pilgrimage to the old Vagabond. 
The Hamlins had noticed the MacLeod yacht of 
course and had wondered if Tom was back from 
India and planning to put the Vagabond in com¬ 
mission. There had been no evidence of life 
aboard, they told him, and if the new owner had 
arrived he must have come late this afternoon. 
The Hamlins were stopping here only over night 
on their way home from Marblehead. They in¬ 
sisted on providing Tom with a shake-down in the 
engine room and he accepted gladly. Good friends 
and good company were a felicitous happening to 
lonely young Tom MacLeod just now. Mrs. Sue 
cooked a jolly supper of frankfurters and hot cof¬ 
fee and accepted with enthusiasm Mr. MacLeod's 
modest contribution toward breakfast. 

It was while the two young men were splashing 
about alongside early next morning that Tom 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 39 

spied signs of life aboard the Vagabond. The 
Buffalo couple were preparing to go ashore. Sub¬ 
merged to the chin and at considerable distance 
across the harbor Tom could not see very dis¬ 
tinctly, but he made out a slim chap in knickers 
who brought the old rowboat around to the steps. 
And then a dainty feminine person in a dark 
wrap (that was she!) descended to the rowboat 
and sat in the stern while the slim chap pulled 
away from the yacht. 

Anyhow, Tom reflected as he hauled himself, 
dripping, up the swimming ladder of the Hamlin 
boat, not a husky enough fellow to have thrown 
the MacLeod overboard if it had come to that. 

The cordial Hamlins tried to persuade Tom to 
cruise with them to New York but he felt too 
restless to settle down aboard the little Susanna. 
He had a notion, he said, about running up to 
New Hampshire for some golf. He’d rather tramp 
round where there were mountains, he explained, 
than look at the sea from any deck but the old 
Vagabond's. They seemed to understand, and 
after a heartening breakfast under the Susanna's 
awning young Tom took his hired dinghy back to 
the dock and returned to the hotel for his bag. 

He was sitting in the Touraine lounge after 


40 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


lunch, looking at a Boston paper and marveling as 
always at the oddly overseasoned appearance of 
the front page (inconsequential advertisements 
peppered through the salt of the day's news), 
when a sound just back of his chair made him 
jump. 

Unmistakably the voice of Growlo. 

Tom craned his head around the chair-back and 
sure enough, there on the floor was the doggish 
leather-trimmed basket. But no dainty Miss 
Puzzled hovered in the offing. A stout person of 
forty or thereabouts approached the basket. A 
maid or companion Tom thought. She was neatly 
though not smartly attired and carried her left 
arm in a sling. Picking up the basket, she fa¬ 
vored the young man whose interest was apparent 
with one of those sheepish grins one dog-lover 
gives another. 

“ Some voice—for such a little one,” remarked 
Mr. MacLeod, answering the dog-lover grin in 
kind. 

The stoutish person laughed outright. No prim 
Bostonian, she. And not a maid exactly either, in 
spite of her staid costume. There was an air of 
pleasant good fellowship about her; not demure 
response to condescension of her betters. “ He’s 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 41 


a Peke,” she informed the interested young man. 
“ His name is Ming, but somebody out home 
always calls him ‘ Rush, the Growler.’ Wouldn’t 
you think, from his voice, he was a Great Dane? ” 

She gave Tom another genial smile and de¬ 
parted (Rush, the Growler making guttural 
sounds in his basket) in the direction of the eleva¬ 
tors. The gate had scarcely clanged when Mr. 
MacLeod was bending over the hotel register. 

Hageboom was the name he was searching for 
but he didn’t find it. Half-way down the page, 
however, was a name that seemed familiar. 

Miss P. Jameson , Coxsackie, New York . 

Well, what were Jamesons of Coxsackie to Tom 
MacLeod—or Hagebooms for the matter of that? 
He wouldn’t fool around here any longer. To¬ 
morrow morning early he’d be off for New Hamp¬ 
shire. There wasn’t anybody in particular he had 
to look up—except little Aunt Judith up at 
Newburgh. Later he must be sure to visit little 
Aunt Judith. His mother would have wanted him 
to do that. 

Just before he had sailed for India Celia and 
he had gone up to Newburgh to see Aunt Judith. 
They had had such a happy day—like a stolen 


42 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

lark. For some reason—Tom didn't know why, 
visits to Aunt Judith by Celia and himself had 
always been surreptitious adventures not referred 
to when they arrived home. Aunt Judith was 
little and timid and she had always cried during 
his mother's visits. She had a tiny house and 
there were always cookies for nephew Tom in a 
certain jar he knew how to find in the pantry. 
Yes, he must certainly go to see Aunt Judith this 
summer. She was a link with his mother's memory 
that must be treasured. 

But first he would have a couple of weeks of 
golf in New Hampshire. . . . Swat something 
good and hard. 


CHAPTER y 


Advertisements accomplish various purposes. 
The one Tom happened upon in next morning's 
Herald changed the destinies of several lives. Or 
rather, since we must believe that an All-Good 
controls human destinies, Tom did not happen 
upon that advertisement; it was, perchance, the 
special and particular thing he had been guided 
Bostonward to find. 

He was reading the Herald over an indifferent 
breakfast at the North Station before departure 
of the train for New Hampshire. No Jamesons 
of Coxsackie, New York, had shown themselves 
about the Touraine during yesterday afternoon or 
evening. Whoever they were, they must be hav¬ 
ing meals served in their rooms. No reason, of 
course, why Mr. MacLeod should care where a 
married couple and a stoutish maid, or maiden 
aunt, enjoyed their meals, or what they did with 
themselves between meals; and at his solitary din¬ 
ner Tom had decided to be off early in the 
morning. 

He was a thorough sort of chap, was young 
43 


44 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Tom, so even without special interest his eye ran 
down column after column of the newspaper 
while he negotiated thinnish coffee, coolish eggs 
and toughish rolls. Destiny again had put the 
advertisement at the top of a column or Tom 
might never have perused it. 

WANTED: Handy-man for 

small yacht. Must have knowledge 
of engine and general work aboard 
a cruising boat. Also be able to do 
simple cooking. Steady, reliable 
person who can give best refer¬ 
ences. Apply Jameson, Yacht 
Vagabond, Marblehead Harbor. 

Mr. MacLeod read this astonishing item three 
times. Then he gazed speculatively into space 
for full three minutes. And then a grin over¬ 
spread his countenance. 

Why not? He had the summer before him. 
Here was opportunity presented, as it were, on a 
platter to cruise on the beloved boat, and (with 
luck) to pursue investigations in the cabin. Of 
course those folks would go ashore sometimes and 
leave the handy-man in charge of the yacht. 

Togged out in sailorman ducks and on a craft 
owned by people from Coxsackie, New York— 
landlubbers undoubtedly and without acquaint¬ 
ances in yachting harbors—it was unlikely he 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 45 


would be recognized by any of his father’s yacht¬ 
ing friends. 

And it would be pleasant (Tom picked the word 
“ pleasant ” from others that occurred to him) to 
be associated even in humble capacity with lovely 
Miss Puzzled and Push, the Growler. Maybe the 
little dog would get fond of him and cuddle in his 
bunk again—that would mean a lot to a lonely 
chap. 

There was that requirement about “simple 
cooking.” Bit of a poser, that. Of course a 
handy-man on a boat was expected to do a turn 
in the galley. Old Saunders had. But people 
cruising on yachts took a good many dinners on 
shore. Tom thought he might risk the galley 
duties. He had done camp cooking in his time 
and like a good many of his sex he took pride in 
his culinary accomplishments. He could broil a 
beefsteak, blend a rarebit or brown a corned beef 
hash with anybody. What they really required, 
probably, was someone to run the engine and 
handle the boat. Coxsackie, New York, people 
wouldn’t know a thing about yachts but they 
probably would about cook-stoves. That cheery 
little stout person would at any rate. 

So instead of buying a ticket for the mountain 


46 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


country of New Hampshire Mr. MacLeod pur¬ 
chased one for Marblehead, Massachusetts. 
First, however, he did some shopping, and instead 
of a smartish young fellow in gray tweeds with 
black-banded straw hat and gray gloves, it was a 
neat but not otherwise noticeable individual who 
boarded the Marblehead train at North Station 
that afternoon. A young fellow in'a navy blue 
ready-made suit and wearing a striped cotton 
shirt and checked cloth cap. This one carried a 
shiny five-dollar suitcase, and a likely looking bag 
plastered with steamer labels was on its way to 
New York to keep company with trunks in 
storage. 

Tom hadn’t much fear of being recognized by 
Growlo’s mistress. In the Pullman she had seen 
only his hand and had not heard his voice. And 
during the night encounter on the Vagabond he 
had been behind the glare of the torch. Also, as 
he remembered, she had done most of the talking. 

Concerning the stoutish person who had spoken 
to him over the dog’s basket he would have to be 
careful, but in the humble handy-man seeking a 
job she would not be likely to recognize a well 
dressed gentleman who had briefly addressed her 
in the Touraine lounge. At least Tom hoped not. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 47 

If you know Marblehead harbor on a blue and 
white day you know the springy lift of spirits 
young Tom MacLeod experienced, coming out on 
the ferry dock that June afternoon. The air was 
like wine. The water twinkled under a westering 
sun. Gay little sailboats darted about like butter¬ 
flies among the stately yachts. Tall masts of 
wonderful racing sloops lifted against the blue sky. 
Across the harbor flags on the Eastern and Co¬ 
rinthian yacht clubs snapped out crisply in the 
breeze that blew straight across the Neck from 
wide reaches of the Atlantic. 

After a minute's search Tom’s eye located the 
Vagabond. She was anchored far down the har¬ 
bor near the causeway and she looked much less 
desolate now with her awning spread from bridge 
to cockpit and the yacht ensign fluttering astern. 
A fellow in a flat-bottomed rowboat was applying 
much needed paint to her sides. Tom regarded 
him with disfavor. Supposing somebody else had 
beaten him to it and secured the handy-man 
job! 

Tom procured a dinghy at the dock and stow¬ 
ing his shiny suitcase aboard rowed out to the 
yacht. The landing steps were down and Tom 
tied his tender and mounted the steps, suitcase in 


48 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

hand. He looked as if he had come to stay and 
he met with no challenge from the painter who 
regarded him without special interest. 

“ Emily! Here comes another one.” 

The whisper drifted through an open port and 
two seconds later a feminine voice called to Tom 
from the cockpit: “Have you come in answer 
to the advertisement? Please step this way.” 

Under the cockpit awning stood a pretty girl 
in middy blouse and short skirt. A very small, 
alert girl who might be nineteen—or twenty-five. 
The middy blouse and hair bobbed in yester¬ 
year’s fashion made her look no more than nine¬ 
teen. The girl had merry hazel eyes and the 
creamy olive skin that sometimes accompanies 
golden hair, and her smile as Tom came forward 
made her little face sunny and winning. 

“ I do hope,” she began, “ you are an American. 
We’ve had two Swedes and a Jap and a colored 
man here to-day.” 

Tom smiled back at her. “ Simon pure Ameri¬ 
can. Born in Boston, U. S. A.” 

“You speak like an educated man,” she said 
quickly. 

“Good education, miss. Went clear through 
high school.” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 49 


“ What experience have you had on yachts? ” 
Tom, anxious not to appear too gracefully well- 
bred, was trying to suggest, by a rather gawky 
attitude, the honest seaman in search of a good 
berth. But just then he spied, in the cabin door¬ 
way, the stoutish person with her arm in a sling, 
and almost dropped his shiny suitcase. Very 
closely she was regarding him and it did seem 
there was something reminiscent in her eye. But 
you could follow the mental processes which dis¬ 
missed as impossible her ridiculous suspicion. 
This was one of those curious cases of type-re¬ 
semblance, that was all. Expressions flitted across 
her open countenance with such perfect clarity 
that the applicant felt cheered. 

“ Been cruising on small yachts since I was a 
kid, miss.” He answered the middy girl who 
seemed to be the one taking the initiative. 

“ You could run this boat? ” 

Tom smiled genially. “ Sure of it ” 

“ Can you cook? ” demanded the stoutish lady 
anxiously. 

“ Let me do the talking, Cousin Phoebe,” in¬ 
terrupted the girl in the middy. She mentioned 
the make of the yacht’s engine. “You under¬ 
stand that one? ” 


50 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

“ Sure,” said Tom reliably. His hands fairly 
itched to get at that selfsame engine. 

“ Could you take this boat anywhere we 
wanted to go? You know this New England 
coast? ” 

“Like a book, ma’am. But you have charts 
aboard I suppose? ” 

“ Charts? ” questioned the lady in the door¬ 
way. 

“ He means those rolled-up things, Cousin 
Phoebe—in the locker on the bridge, you know.” 
To Tom, in an awed tone, “You mean to say 
you can run a boat by charts? ” 

“ Oh, sure,” affirmed Tom capably. He felt he 
was passing satisfactorily . . . but where was 

the rest of the party? 

“Maybe if I could talk with the gentle¬ 
man -” he ventured tentatively. 

“ What gentleman? ” snapped the middy girl. 

“ Why—the boss, miss. The owner of the boat. 
He and I could come to an understanding quicker, 
maybe-” 

“ Pm hiring you,” informed the bobbed young 
person. “ There is no gentleman on board-” 

“ Hm-hmp-hm,” came warningly from within 
the cabin. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 51 
“—except,” promptly continued the girl in the 

middy, “ my brother. And he is-” 

“Ask him for his references, Fran.” From 
within the cabin again. Tom held his breath: 

The voice of Miss Puzzled! 

And at that moment a small object from which 
proceeded fearful growls launched itself past the 
stout lady’s skirts and fell upon the boots of the 
prospective handy-man. Growlo, however, speed¬ 
ily recognized an acquaintance. He fell back, 
gazed searchingly at the newcomer’s face and 
then, with tail frenziedly awag, leaped and pawed 
at Tom’s trouser-legs. Fortunately the stout lady 
had turned her head to speak to the occupant of 
the cabin. 

“Ming rarely makes friends with strangers,” 
commented the girl in the middy and favored 
Tom with he? sunny smile again. Tom couldn’t 
resist smiling back. And later he found that no¬ 
body could. When Frances smiled that sunny 
smile of hers people smiled back. She was sunny 
clear through from her golden mop of hair to the 
golden heart of her. If Tom hadn’t seen Miss 
Puzzled first . . . 

He put down the suitcase, fumbled in the ap¬ 
proved honest seaman manner for his credentials, 


52 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


and producing a folded sheet of paper handed it 
respectfully to the girl in the middy. What she 
perused was an attractively worded encomium 
attesting the general good character and efficiency 
of one Tom Griggs, an employee for years on the 
writer’s own yacht. And the letter was signed by 
one T. H. Smith, who wrote a dashing hand on 
the notepaper of a Long Island Sound yacht club. 
Luckily Tom had found the sheet of paper tucked 
away in his writing-case. Earnest endeavor had 
erased the penciled addresses scrawled upon it— 
and of course an honest seaman’s reference would 
have a grimy, long-folded look anyhow. 

“A very good recommendation.” The young 
lady looked Tom over from top to toe. What 
she saw, evidently, was as pleasing to her taste 
as the excellent credentials. She smiled again. 
This time Tom refrained from smiling back 
and managed to look properly anxious and re¬ 
spectful. 

“ Very well, Griggs—or shall we call you 
Tom?” 

“ Tom will do, miss.” 

“ Tom, then. I am going to engage you. You 
look an honest fellow and—and strong and de¬ 
pendable. That’s what we need: someone strong 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 53 


and dependable who will—will sort of take care of 
us. Now about your wages,—what did you get 
in your last place? " 

Tom registered the proper interest of an honest 
seaman in this important matter and mentioned 
the sum he thought old Saunders had been paid. 
After a moment's hesitation, “ All right," she said. 
“ And now you can come inside and be introduced 
to my brother, Mr. Emerson Jameson. He is a— 
a convalescent and we are taking this cruise for 
the benefit of his health." 

So Tom followed obediently down the com¬ 
panion steps into the cabin. The familiar interior 
of that cabin caught at young Tom's heartstrings. 
Everything was the same; the dusky walnut 
paneling, the blue velvet cushions on the transoms 
and sheer blue silk curtains fluttering at the ports, 
Cliff's books on a shelf, Cliff's palette with blobs 
of dried color on a peg beside the ship's clock. 
Even Celia's snapshot of the Vagabond at anchor, 
framed and hanging between the ports. Tom 
knew he could, with a magnifying glass, pick out 
himself sitting cross-legged in his bathing suit on 
the bow deck. 

These inanimate things, however, had but an 
instant to flash at him their stabbing memories. 


54 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


There was something else in the cabin that com¬ 
manded his full attention. 

Reclining on one of the transoms was one who 
appeared to be a delicate youth. A knicker suit 
of heather mixed worsted hung loosely on his slim 
frame and (even in that cabin and against those 
pillows) he was wearing a cloth golf cap, much 
too large and pulled well down over his ears. He 
had big brown eyes that regarded the new em¬ 
ployee with languid interest. 

In convalescent Brother Emerson Mr. Mac¬ 
Leod recognized without a shadow of doubt Miss 
Puzzled of the Pullman. 


CHAPTER YI 


In the crew’s cubby up forward the new handy¬ 
man sat on his pipe cot and did some profound 
thinking. 

The shiny suitcase gaped open on the floor, its 
contents awaiting distribution on pegs and in 
lockers. The handy-man was supposed to be 
making ready for his duties but deep reflection 
had interrupted. 

“ Funny business,” ruminated Mr. MacLeod, 
puffing cigarette smoke through the open skylight 
above his head. Three women alone on a yacht 
and picking a skipper through an ad! That girl 
posing as “ brother ” and the stout person posing 
as “ cousin.” No more a relative of those girls, 
that stout one, than he was, Tom felt positive. 

Of course the E. B. Jameson in the hotel register 
had been the girl he had seen in the Pullman. 
No wonder that room-clerk had looked queer. 
Her name was Emily—someone had called her 
that as he came up the steps. Emily Jameson 
. . . but why this elaborate disguise as 

“ Brother Emerson ” ? 


55 


56 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

What were these three women doing alone on 
the Vagabond? And where were they bound for? 
Well, wherever it was he would take ’em there. 
“ Someone strong and dependable to take care of 
us,” the middy girl had said to him. Looked as 
though they needed someone to take care of them! 
Lucky they had him and not the Swede or Jap or 
African who had applied before he came- 

Suddenly he sat up straight. Where was her 
husband? She had distinctly said, “ My husband 
is asleep in here,” night before last when she had 
ordered the intruder off the Vagabond. And Tom 
had certainly seen the couple leaving the yacht 
next morning. 

But stay,—what he had seen was a slim fellow 
in knickers and a smallish girl in a dark wrap. 
Why not Brother Emerson—in the very knicker 
suit to-day envisioned? And of course the maiden 
in the dark wrap would have been sunny-haired 
Sister Frances. At this illuminating thought 
young Tom’s spirits went up with such a bound 
that he sprang to his feet and dropped his ciga¬ 
rette into the gaping suitcase, and was only re¬ 
called to recollection of it by a smell of burning 
wool. He slapped out the sparks in his new 
handy-man’s knitted jumper just in time. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 57 


There wasn’t any husband. She wasn’t married 
at all. The little rascal had simply invented a 
husband to intimidate the nocturnal prowler 
aboard her yacht. 

He whistled cheerily—the first time young Tom 
had whistled in months and months—as he stored 
away his belongings. Well, wherever they were 
going; however they had got possession of this 
yacht, he was going with ’em. They couldn’t lose 
him! 

He looked with satisfaction around his quarters 
for (he hoped) the next two months. It was cozy 
and tidy up for’ard here, with a big skylight to 
give air in addition to the ports, and in the lava¬ 
tory tucked in the bow was a shower, an unwonted 
luxury in crew’s quarters. The bunks were sup¬ 
plied with warm blankets and there was an ex¬ 
cellent mirror for shaving. Tom would be very 
comfortable—and oh, the joy of cruising on the 
old Vagabond! Virtually her skipper too, in full 
charge of boat and engine. 

He looked very trim and jaunty when he came 
up through the hatch in his white duck breeches 
and jumper, a little Jackie cap cockily aslant on 
his head. Nobody was about so after pottering 
round on the bridge a bit and straddling before 


58 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


the wheel just to see how it felt to have his grip 
on it again, he slipped down to have a look at 
the engine. It had been thoroughly overhauled 
at the shipyard and everything seemed in tip-top 
condition. He was poking about with a wrench, 
lost in blissful examination of the engine’s vitals, 
when he heard the voice of Sister Frances. She 
was standing at the top of the ladder that led 
down from the bridge. 

Cousin Phoebe, he was informed, had a fancy for 
veal cutlets for dinner. Everything was in the 
icebox and they would leave it entirely to him. 
Hereafter, of course, he would attend to the mar¬ 
keting himself. 

Now as anybody versed in the culinary art well 
knows, nothing—with the exception perhaps of 
puff pastry—may so easily, to the amateur, spell 
disaster as veal cutlet. If Cousin Phoebe with 
malicious intent to test the new hireling had se¬ 
lected that dinner she could not have done better. 
Tom, however, accepted the cutlet without appre¬ 
hension. Any person who had mastered Differ¬ 
ential Calculus, he presumed, could prepare food 
by following recipes in a cook-book. And the 
cook-book he had carefully added to the contents 
of his new suitcase. He merely inquired what 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 59 

time dinner was desired and went back to blissful 
communion with the engine. 

Pottering round in the lockers he came across 
an ancient pipe of Cliffs. He could see Cliff, the 
pipe in his mouth, tinkering busily and arguing 
with old Saunders. Very tenderly Tom tucked 
the pipe in his pocket. None of his employers 
would be likely to want it so it should be his solace 
now. 

When the ship’s clock struck three bells he re¬ 
gretfully tore himself away from the engine, went 
forward to the crew’s cubby for his trusty cook¬ 
book and repaired to the galley. 

But cook-stoves are tricky things. And so are 
printed recipes. The section in the cook-book 
devoted to veal, though it seemed to say a lot 
about the proper color of veal and its dietetic 
qualities, gave little information about what to 
do next. Tom learned, for instance, that veal 
contains more nitrogen and less gelatine than beef 
and that it stands lowest among heat-producing 
foods; but there was plenty of heat in the galley 
and in the chef’s face during its transformation 
into a proper cutlet. The authority casually sug¬ 
gested crumbs and beaten egg and made obscure 
mention of “a brown gravy.” Anyhow Tom 


60 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


knew how to boil potatoes and open a can of peas. 
Doubtless all the peas required was warming up 
in the tasty sauce that seemed to accompany 
them. 

His culinary shortcomings were more than made 
up for, however, by his cheerful zeal. He dashed 
up and down the steps from galley to bridge, dish- 
towel draped knowingly over one arm, and flushed 
face albeit anxious, modestly proud withal. And 
on the bridge deck the table, with white cloth 
fluttering and silverware marked with the yacht’s 
name nicely arranged, certainly looked very at¬ 
tractive. 

There was a peculiar expression on the faces of 
the diners as they negotiated the strange substance 
dappled with smears of fried egg and floating in a 
pallid, floury liquid. 

“ Maybe the Jap could cook,” was the cruel 
observation that dropped from the beautiful lips 
of Brother Emerson. (Tom heard it with an¬ 
guish, down in the galley.) 

“ Sh-ssh,” he caught also the cautioning whisper 
of Sister Frances. “ The Jap couldn’t have run 
the engine. And that colored man had a mean 
eye. To-morrow we’ll order something from the 
delicatessen.” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 61 

There was a splash alongside. Through the 
galley port Tom glimpsed something sailing 
downward into the deep—it looked like a chunk 
of cutlet. Followed two boiled potatoes. When 
he carried up the iced melon a little later plates 
scraped clean spoke reassuringly of splendid ap¬ 
petites around the table. 

“ We ought to have those melon spoons,” re¬ 
marked Cousin Phoebe. 

“You mean the pointed spoons with handles 
shaped like anchors? ” The handy-man, anxious 
to please, hopped back to his galley. But he could 
not find the melon spoons. When he returned to 
the bridge an earnest conversation seemed to be 
checked abruptly but the ladies accepted the 
spoons he proffered and finished their melon in 
silence. 

When everything was washed up and shipshape 
in the galley the handy-man presented himself 
respectfully in the cockpit. The sunset guns of 
the yacht clubs on the Neck had just boomed 
over the water and lights were sparkling out on 
the anchored boats. Tom took the furled ensign 
from Sister Frances and inquired if after he had 
put up the riding lantern he might row ashore and 


62 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


return his hired dinghy. “ I’ll take the little dog 
if you like,” he offered. 

“ Why, that’s fine, Tom. Ming does need to 
stretch his legs on shore. But ”—anxiously— 
“ you won’t be away from the yacht long, will 
you?” 

“ No indeed, miss. Shall I inquire at the post- 
office? ” 

Brother Emerson and the ladies looked at each 
other. 

“We are not expecting letters at this port,” 
Frances told him. “ No, please don’t bother. In 
fact we prefer not to have our names mentioned 
ashore at all, Tom-” 

Brother Emerson cut in on this. “ Trying to 
dodge visitors, Tom, just for a bit—until I feel 
more up to it. We should be obliged if you say 
nothing to anybody about us. We expect to leave 
the harbor immediately.” 

“ I see, sir. Very good, sir.” 

The excellent handy-man, accompanied by 
Growlo, rowed away from the Vagabond. The 
painter fellow had long since finished his job and 
departed. Tom glanced approvingly at the swan 
white coat of the yacht. She was pointing her 
nose into the ocean breeze, her stern lying toward 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 63 

the Marblehead shore and as Tom pulled away 
he saw something that made him suddenly shove 
oars against the water and hold the tender while 
he gazed. 

Across his Vagabond’s stern was now printed, 
in yet undried letters: 

GLEAM 

Connecticut 


CHAPTER VII 


Tom and the Peke stretched their legs up the 
steep hill of Marblehead and along the quaint, 
winding shore road clear to the ancient fort. Here 
young MacLeod got out his pipe and sat for some 
time in profound meditation while Growlo sniffed 
about in the grass. It was gratefully cool after 
the day’s heat—and the heat of his hectic hour 
in the galley — and so still that voices on the 
anchored boats came clearly over the water. The 
incoming tide splashed against the ledges below. 
Across the harbor was the low green line of the 
Neck and on the long dock of the Corinthian 
Yacht Club a string of white-globed lamps glim¬ 
mered like pearls against the dark breast of the 
shore. Out at the harbor entrance the submarine 
tender was ablaze with jewels of light, its landing 
steps a fairy pathway down to a fairy golden 
carpet on the still black water. Sapphire lights 
crackled on the signal mast and answering sap¬ 
phires twinkled on the mast of a gunboat further 
down the harbor. 

Cliff and Celia had always loved it so here! 

64 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 65 


But young Tom to-night was thinking about 
matters of very present significance. 

Why Gleam, Connecticut—instead of Vaga> 
bond, New York? 

And why such trepidation at his natural sug¬ 
gestion about asking for mail at the post-office? 

Obviously his party was earnestly avoiding 
recognition. And obviously the girl posing as 
Brother Emerson was the one most desirous of 
concealing her identity. He recalled her anxious 
scanning of faces on the platform at South Sta¬ 
tion. She was afraid of being followed. But by 
whom? 

He did not believe her name was Jameson. Or 
that any of them hailed from Coxsackie, New 
York. If they had gone to so much trouble to 
alter the identity of the yacht they had never 
signed their real names in the Touraine register. 
And they had traveled separately. The girl 
Emily fleeing first from somebody or something 
and the others joining her later. 

How had these women come into possession of 
the Vagabondf And where were they intending 
to take the yacht—and Mr. Thomas MacLeod? 

Tom was young enough to feel a pleasurable 
thrill of anticination in the adventure, whatever 


66 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


it was, rather than any self-protective qualm of 
concern. Happen what might he was on the 
jolly old Vagabond. Skipper, no less, despite his 
lowly rating as handy-man aboard. And in some 
way not yet disclosed he was taking care of the 
loveliest girl he had ever set eyes on. Well, he’d 
take care of her! Whatever she was fleeing from; 
wherever she might be going, she had somebody 
now to depend upon beside that pair of women. 
Tom MacLeod wasn’t going to let any harm come 
to her. 

He hoped she wasn’t going to wear that boy’s 
outfit and the detestable cap throughout the 
cruise. He liked her much better as Miss Puzzled 
in appealing feminine guise. She was not little, 
this Emily Jameson, though her small head and 
dainty features gave her the effect of littleness 
and feminine appeal. She was quite a tall girl— 
five or six inches over five feet, Tom thought, and 
slender with the graceful slenderness of small 
bones beautifully covered'. Tom had never been 
partial to the pocket-Venus type of girl. Tiny, 
women were cunning and appealing at twenty but 
at forty they were apt to lack presence and 
dignity. And at forty plumpness added to short 
stature was abominable. A girl ought to be slim 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 67 

enough and tall enough to promise grace and 
charm at forty—like Celia’s. A girl whose eyes 
were near the level of one’s own—not peering up 
at one coquettishly. 

This was how Tom put it to himself. What he 
really meant was that the woman dream to him 
was a companion and a mate, not a pet or a play¬ 
thing: somebody he could talk man-talk to, not 
baby-talk. You had to jolly those “ little girls,” 
they always expected it. Tom had never had 
much use for them. 

Down the shore road of old Marblehead he 
swung blithely, tired Growlo riding in the crook 
of his arm. Somehow life seemed much less 
lonely than it had yesterday, the future much less 
forlorn in prospect. Tom saw the yacht’s lights 
across the water and whistled softly over his oars, 
rowing back home. 

Brother Emerson this evening also had things 
to think about. Affairs that demanded profound 
meditation in solitude. And despite his much 
advertised delicacy the night air did not seem to 
bother him for Mr. MacLeod discovered the at¬ 
tractive youth smoking a cigarette up forward, 
back against the open skylight and knickered legs 
stretched negligently along the bow deck. 


68 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

“ I wanted a word with you, Tom,” vouchsafed 
Brother Emerson pleasantly, “away from the 
womenfolk.” 

“ Quite so, sir,” acquiesced the handy-man 
gravely. 

“ I see you have your pipe, Tom. Go ahead 
and light up. No objection. I’m a smoker my¬ 
self.” 

“ Thank you, sir.” What the handy-man saw 
was that Brother Emerson was a smoker of very 
recent persuasion. But lately, it was evident, had 
he cultivated the manly art and as yet avoided 
the pernicious though comforting practise of in¬ 
haling. Instead, he daintily puffed out whiffs of 
smoke between determinedly pursed lips. 

“ Tom, have you been on this boat before? ” 

Tom jumped—but he had an inspiration. “ On 
the Gleam f No, sir.” 

“ Then how did you know our melon spoons 
have handles shaped like anchors? ” 

Before answering this the handy-man had to 
draw several times on his pipe to get the thing 
properly started. “ Why, sir, melon spoons on 
yachts usually do have anchor handles, don’t 
they? And grapefruit spoons and all such fancy 
silver? ” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 69 

This was evidently news to the owner of the 
Gleam, but an easy nod dismissed these curious 
seafaring customs as inconsequential. 

“ What boat were you on before you came to 
us?” 

Tom gave the name of the good ship that had 
fetched him across the Pacific Ocean. He was 
prepared to state also his useful position in the 
liner's crew but Brother Emerson had his mind 
on something else. 

“ Well, Tom, I like you and I believe you are 
just the man we need, but I have to know a little 
more about you. Sit down, please.” The half- 
smoked cigarette was flipped overboard and an¬ 
other one retrieved from the silver case Brother 
Emerson fished out of a coat pocket. “ Of course, 
I know very well you are no ordinary seaman. 
You don't talk like it and you don't walk like it— 
except when you remember. You are—you are 
just as much a gentleman as I am.” 

Luckily the handy-man, respectfully lighting a 
match for his employer's cigarette, had face bent 
over his cupped hands. Perfectly grave his visage 
when he lifted the safely burning match to the 
cigarette. Brother Emerson choked a trifle over 
the indrawn smoke, then continued: 


70 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 
“ Is Tom Griggs your real name? ” 

“ Part of it.” 

“ You don’t care to tell me all of it? ” 

“ I’d rather not, sir, if you don’t mind—for the 
present.” 

“How long since you were on that boat you 
just mentioned? ” 

“ I left her a week ago to-day.” 

“ What made you apply for work on this par¬ 
ticular yacht? ” 

“ I saw your advertisement in the paper.” 

“That was the only reason? Nobody”— 
Brother Emerson turned and shot the question 
sharply—“ Nobody sent you here? ” 

Tom began to get a glimmer. (So that was 
what she was worrying about!) “Nobody,” he 
asserted firmly. “ I was out of a job. I was 
broke. I’ve helped on a yacht before. I saw the 
advertisement and answered it. I can assure you 
of that on my honor. About my personal affairs 
I’d rather not speak, if you don’t mind.” 

They looked at each other in the moonlight for 
the space of twenty seconds, the gray eyes quiet 
and straightforward, the brown ones searching and 
a bit pleading. Constant attention was necessary ^ 
to keep it always in mind that those speaking eyes 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 71 

of brown were Brother Emerson’s eyes and not the 
lovely girl-eyes of Miss Puzzled. “ You can trust 
me—sir,” assured the handy-man with great 
earnestness. “ I’ll be glad to help you any way I 
can.” 

The young moon rode high now, making a silver 
path on the black water of the harbor. Over on 
the submarine tender they were playing Taps. 
Gray eyes held brown eyes another score of sec¬ 
onds. What gray eyes asserted seemed to carry 
conviction for brown eyes took on a happier, less 
harassed expression. 

“ I guess you’ve had trouble too,” the owner of 
the Gleam whispered. “ But I—I don’t believe 
you’re running away from it. I don’t believe 
you’d run away from anything. I shan’t ask why 
you are here, Tom, but—I’m glad—you are.” 

“ Thank you,” said Tom. And forgot to add 
the “ sir.” 

Brother Emerson did not seem to notice it. 
“ Now,” said he briskly, “ what do you know of 
this coast? ” 

“ Have I cruised along it, you mean? ” 

“ Yes. Do you know all the harbors and the 
safe channels? ” 

“ Like a book—from Bar Harbor to Minot.” 


72 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

“ What’s Minot? ” 

Tom turned and pointed southward across the 
causeway that blocked their end of the harbor. 
Jewel bright against the deep blue sky of night a 
wonderful flash appeared and disappeared, ap¬ 
peared and disappeared—three times as they 
gazed. 

“ Minot Light/’ explained Tom. “ Watch! ” 

“ One flash. Four flashes. Three flashes,” she 
counted. “ It must mean something.” 

Tom’s gaze was on the charming profile and 
tender line of cheek to throat as the small head 
twisted over a shoulder. 

“ Yes/’ he mentioned dreamily, “ ‘ I love you.’ ” 

“What’s that?” Brother Emerson swung 
back to a position squarely facing the handy¬ 
man. 

“They call it that:—the ‘I love you’ light. 
One flash, four flashes, three flashes, I . . . 

love . . . you. Writers have made stories 
about it.” 

“ Oh, I see.” Brother Emerson shrugged tweed- 
coated shoulders as though this were girl stuff be¬ 
neath his masculine interest. “ Very pretty. 
About those harbors now, do you know any that 
are—well, quiet and isolated? Not a gang of 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 73 


summer hotel people on shore, you understand; 

or yachts coming and going-" 

“ Not many along this coast—in summer time 
and where there are waters deep enough for a 
yacht this size. Or where there are yacht clubs." 

“ I don't care anything about yacht clubs. As 
you know I am on this boat for quiet, after—after 

a nervous breakdown from—from overstudy-" 

The nerve-broken one produced another cigarette 
and accepting the handy-man's proffered match 
coughed and then puffed perseveringly. “ What 
I—what my sister and cousin want is to avoid 
people, and excursion boats, and crowds. Could 
you take us, say, to some island where boats are 
not likely to come? " 

“ How about Monhegan? " 

“ Monhegan—where’s that? " 

“ An island off the coast of Maine. Thirty-five 
miles out from Portland." 

“ Why you could hardly see the mainland from 
there, could you? " 

“ Only on a clear day. Few yachts put in to 
Monhegan harbor but there's good anchorage and 
the big mackerel schooners come and go. Mostly 
fisher folk live there—and a colony of artists in 
summer time. No automobiles of course, and I 


74 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

believe only one horse on the island—to haul 
trunks up from the dock.” 

Brother Emerson’s eyes gleamed. “ How long 
will it take us to get there? ” 

“ Well, it could be done in a day’s cruise, but 
I’d advise an overnight stop, maybe at Portland or 
Boothbay. It would be pleasanter. And it’s 
better to keep fairly close to the coast than to cut 
right out to sea in a boat as small as this—espe¬ 
cially with only one man aboard. I mean”— 
supplemented Tom hastily, “only one man in 
the crew” 

“ Oh, I can help you if necessary,” assured the 
Gleam's owner, “ but we don’t want to take fool¬ 
ish risks, of course.” 

The slim, boyish figure stood up and the handy¬ 
man rose also. “ Monhegan it is then,” decided 
Brother Emerson. “ We’ll start in the morning. 
I’ve stocked up with gas and water but you can 
go ashore early and buy supplies for the kitchen— 
galley I mean.” 

“ Very well, sir.” Tom fell back to the handy¬ 
man’s respectful mode of address as his young 
employer’s voice took on crisp tone of command. 

“All right . . . and, Tom, you needn’t keep 
sticking that ‘ sir ’ at the end of every sentence 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 75 

when we are talking together by ourselves.” Sud¬ 
denly brown eyes were atwinkle with laughter 
though Brother Emerson’s lips kept their dignified 
gravity. For the life of him Tom couldn’t help 
an answering twinkle. He bowed with all the 
grace of the debonair Cliff MacLeod. 

“ You are most kind/’ he murmured. 

Brother Emerson moved aft toward the bridge, 
hesitated, and then returned. The face lifted to 
Tom’s in the moonlight was very feminine and 
distinctly imploring. 

“ Tom—you won’t let anybody —anybody come 
aboard the boat, day or night, will you? ” 

Tom looked down into the lifted face for an¬ 
other score of seconds. 

“ I won’t,” promised the handy-man. 

A small hand—surprisingly small and soft for 
even a delicate youth—reached out and rested for 
a brief instant in the hand that was surprisingly 
supple and smooth for the paw of an able seaman. 
“ Thank you,” breathed Tom’s employer grate¬ 
fully. “ Good-night, Tom.” 

Mr. MacLeod thus abandoned to solitary con¬ 
templation of the harbor and the moonlight, 
dropped through the hatch into his cozy quarters 
below. But before switching on the light and 


76 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

making ready for that much anticipated night of 
repose on board the Vagabond he looked long and 
earnestly through a port that faced southward. 

One-four-three, flashed the distant jewel-bright 
beam of Minot. One-four-three. / . . . 
love . . . you. I . . . love . . . 

you. 


CHAPTER Vlir 


Breakfast passed without mishap. Tom knew 
all about boiling eggs and browning toast and 
after his early swim he had slipped ashore for a 
bottle of cream. His efforts aroused such expres¬ 
sions of pleasure that he hoped the melancholy 
cutlet had been forgotten. After breakfast, ac¬ 
companied by Growlo, he made a marketing trip 
and came back with a good honest beefsteak which 
would offer no baffling complications. 

He brought out fifty pounds of ice, and fruit 
and vegetables. If they were getting away on a 
long cruise a proper steward must have his larder 
stocked. Frances hung over the rail and watched 
the stores being brought up from the tender. “ It 
really looks as if we were going somewhere,” she 
called genially to the hard-working crew who was 
staggering up the steps with a box of groceries. 

The handy-man smiled back at her as he set 
down the box and paused to mop his brow. It 
was a breezeless day. Colors hung limp from the 
masts of the yacht clubs on the Neck and not a 

sail was astir in the harbor. 

77 


78 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

“ The heat’s bad enough/’ complained Cousin 
Phoebe who was fanning furiously in a deck chair, 
“but that noise is worse. It’s been going on 
steady—since seven o’clock this morning. What 
on earth is it? ” 

“ The submarine tender,” Tom explained. “ Re¬ 
charging her batteries. They are likely to go on 
all day. I’ve known them to go on all night.” 

“ Then the sooner we leave, the better,” snapped 
Cousin Phoebe, “ before poor Emmie has hysterics. 
My land, doesn’t anybody here do anything about 
it? All these rich cottage folks-” 

“ Government business,” laughed Tom. “ Well, 
we’ll be out of it in half an hour-” 

“ I’d stop it! ” Brother Emerson spoke wrath- 
fully from the door of the forward cabin which 
opened from the bridge. “ If I had to stay long 
in this harbor I’d—I’d write to Washington.” 

“ Em— your cap,” warned Cousin Phoebe hastily 
and Tom chuckled. Even at breakfast the dis¬ 
figuring headgear had been in evidence; Brother 
Emerson made no bones of wearing it at table 
among his womenfolk. (Mr. Jameson was trou¬ 
bled with neuralgia, Cousin Phoebe had explained 
carefully to the handy-man.) 

“ If that isn’t like Em,” Frances commented. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 79 
“ Em would stop anything that was annoying, no 
matter who did it.” 

“ Certainly I would,” retorted the Gleam’s 
owner, reappearing properly covered in the door¬ 
way. “ Why bear with annoyances? Why bear 
anything you don’t like if there is a way of stop¬ 
ping it? ” There was something very imperious 
in the lift of the little chin. 

Not so sweet tempered after all, was the obser¬ 
vant handy-man’s reflection. He caught Cousin 
Phoebe’s sorrowful glance at the lovely, defiant 
face in the doorway. 

“ Sometimes we have to, dearie. Some things 
we can’t stop—or get away from.” 

The brown eyes flashed sparks. “ You think so? 
Well, we differ. And please keep your meek senti¬ 
ments to yourself.” 

But instantly she was across the deck and on her 
knees beside Cousin Phoebe’s chair. “ Oh, I’m so 
sorry. I’m a beast to speak to you like that. 
Phoebe, Phoebe, you know-” 

“ I know, dearie.” A loving hand patted the 
quivering shoulder. The brown head with its 
boy’s cap awry was cuddled against Cousin 
Phoebe’s breast and the girl’s slim arms were tight 
around the older woman’s neck. 


80 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Young Tom perceived of course that matters of 
more moment than the chug of the sub-tender’s 
engine were being touched upon. Miss Puzzled 
wasn’t all appealing charm; she had a touchy 
temper and a will of her own. Perhaps her tem¬ 
per and her imperious will had brought upon her 
the trouble from which she was fleeing. Tom 
wondered if she wasn’t a little spoiled. Of course 
if she owned the yacht there was wealth enough 
back of her to give her about everything she 
wanted. Well, it would be a long day before Tom 
MacLeod commanded money enough to look at a 
girl in that class. . . . 

“ On board Gleam! ” came crisply up to them. 
A launch had drawn in to the steps and a young 
fellow in blue serge was preparing to step aboard 
the yacht. 

The handy-man, leaping down the steps, stayed 
off the launch with an out-thrust foot. At that 
hail alongside Frances had ducked below the can¬ 
vas-covered rail of the bridge and the other two, 
stooping almost to all-fours, had scuttled toward 
the door of the cabin. 

“Yes, sir?” inquired the handy-man respect¬ 
fully of the man in the launch. 

Visitors to Marblehead Harbor? ” suggested 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 81 

the blue-serged gentleman pleasantly. “ From 
Connecticut, I see. What town? ” 

“ Tom! ” came an imperative summons from 
within the cabin. 

The handy-man with an apologetic “ One mo¬ 
ment, sir/’ flung at the occupant of the launch, 
dashed to the cabin door. 

“ Tom, don’t give him any information. Be 
very careful.” 

“ Trust me for that,” assured their protector. 
He dashed back to the deck and down the steps. 

“ Begging your pardon, sir, we’ve an invalid on 
board. My boss has to have perfect quiet. No 
conversation alongside—that’s orders.” 

“ I see. But I suppose you can tell me at least 
the names of your party and what yacht club they 
represent. I notice you have no club pennant 
flying-” 

“ I’ll tell you nothing,” retorted Tom trucu¬ 
lently. “ I’ve my orders and if you keep me 
chinning here you’ll lose me my job.” He re¬ 
treated up the steps, and after staring a long 
moment at Tom and then at the yacht the young 
man in blue serge gave curt order for the launch 
to back away. 

Three anxious faces awaited Tom in the cabin. 


82 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


“ Do you think,” queried Brother Emerson 
shakily, “ he might be a detective? ” 

“ Why, no,” said Tom, “ I don't. I reckon he's 
some newspaper chap getting local items about 
visiting yachts and names of people on board.” 

Frances let go a long breath of relief. “ You 
think that was all, Tom? ” 

“ Why yes, Miss Frances. And if you people 
will pardon my making a suggestion wouldn't it 
be wiser to give the names of your party and 
some place in Connecticut to a newspaper man— 
or in fact to anybody making inquiry in a harbor 
—than to arouse curiosity and—and ” Sus¬ 
picion, he had been going to add but he sub¬ 
stituted “ antagonism.” 

“No.” Brother Emerson's lips shut tight on 
the word. “ I won't have a word of information 
given to anybody. It's nobody's business who we 
are or where we came from. We have a right to 
anchor in any harbor, haven't we, Tom? ” 

Harbors were free to all, he assured them. 

“ And nobody could force a way aboard if we 
forbade it, could he? ” 

“ Not while I'm here.” The handy-man flexed 
and stretched a strong right arm. 

“ Well then, don't let anybody on board. I 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 83 

depend on you, Tom. And the sooner we get out 
of here the better I shall be pleased.” 

In the engine room Tom paused with his oil 
can tipped just short of the priming cup. 

Detectives anticipated! 

And his three charges scared into fits at the 
possibility. Now what, in heaven's name, had 
those three—or one of 'em:—done to warrant 
detectives being put on the yacht's trail? And 
how would one Thomas MacLeod, son of her erst¬ 
while owner (here young Tom began to have his 
first bleak doubts) be complicated in the mess? 

That pretty Miss Puzzled was involved in any 
difficulty of criminal significance he refused to 
believe. The idea was too preposterous. Neither 
could he believe it of sunny Frances of the win¬ 
ning smile, nor of stout, kindly Cousin Phcebe. 
No, whatever these three were running away from 
it was nothing that put them outside the pale of 
the law. They were merely running away—or 
she was—from unrelished authority and the fear 
of detectives was the fear of being traced and 
overtaken. Tom was going to stick by his three 
charges. What in time would those helpless dears 
do without a competent male protector aboard? 
Mighty lucky for them he had happened on their 


84 LIGHTS ALONG THE. LEDGES 

advertisement. But for that fortuitous happen¬ 
ing the three might be at this moment faring 
forth with nobody but a stupid Swede or self- 
centered Jap to look after them. 

There wasn't going to be much chance to search 
for Celia’s letter though. Nobody on board seemed 
to have any intention of venturing ashore. That 
wild dive below the rail canvas of the bridge at 
first hint of a hail alongside had been significant. 
And of course Brother Emerson, posing as an in¬ 
valid, would never leave the yacht. Tom would 
have to be sure of a good half hour alone on the 
boat before attempting to pry loose that panel. 
The racket would be audible from stem to stern. 
One can get out of sight of others on a small 
yacht but scarcely out of sound. 

The aft cabin of the Vagabond was at the rear 
of the deck house and three steps led down into it 
from the cockpit. This had been Cliff’s and 
Celia’s room and was now occupied by Frances 
and Cousin Phoebe. It was the general sitting- 
room when inclement weather made the open 
bridge deck uncomfortable. There were cushioned 
transoms under the ports and a center table over 
which swung a shaded lamp. Deep wicker chairs, 
cupboards with leaded glass doors and a little 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 85 


writing desk tucked in at one side of the com¬ 
panion steps made the place very comfortable as 
an indoor lounge. 

Forward of this large cabin there was a partition 
amidship. To starboard was the small but luxuri¬ 
ously furnished room now occupied by Brother 
Emerson, and on the port side of the partition a 
small bathroom and forward of that the galley. 
From the forward cabin and the galley shallow 
circular steps led up to the bridge deck. Thus 
meals could be served either on the bridge or in 
the aft cabin, and occupants of the deck house 
could reach the bridge either by the steps forward, 
or by way of the cockpit and deck. Directly under 
the bridge was the engine room and sliding doors 
between forward cabin and engine room, and also 
between engine room and crew’s quarters in the 
bow, made it possible to pass from one end of the 
boat to the other without stepping on deck. 

But it will be seen that there was small chance 
for the handy-man to pursue investigations be¬ 
hind the panel unless he had both cabins and in 
fact the whole boat to himself. Tom could only 
hope that when the yacht reached more remote 
harbors his employers might venture ashore for 
needed exercise. 


86 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

And the sooner they started, the better! 

The sea was glassy smooth this morning and no 
wind was stirring so Tom had not much difficulty 
in hoisting the anchor, starting the engine and 
jumping to the bridge for control of the wheel. 
But he foresaw his job of skipper might have com¬ 
plications in rougher weather or in a more crowded 
harbor where the yacht might drift down on other 
craft before she acquired headway. And running 
into harbor before a squall would be worse yet. 
Since there was no one but himself capable of 
taking the wheel he ought to ask for a second 
helper in the crew. 

But Tom detested the thought of sharing his 
cozy cubby forward with some brawny Swede or 
insufferable Jap (even if the Jap could cook!). 
No, he’d manage by himself, some way—and per¬ 
haps he could teach one of those girls to steer the 
boat. Maybe Brother Emerson could. 

But presently to his glad surprise Brother 
Emerson demonstrated that he both could—and 
would. 


CHAPTER IX 


Brother Emerson indeed could scarce control 
his ebullition of spirits when the Gleam swept 
past the harbor buoys and out into the open At¬ 
lantic on the first leg of her course northward. 
It might almost be said of Brother Emerson that 
leaving behind the anxieties of harbor existence 
had made a new man of him. 

He whistled. He laughed—laughed as only one 
whose youthful gay heartedness has been bottled 
up by prolonged suspense can laugh when cruel 
pressure is removed. He forgot completely his 
invalidism (all but the cap that carefully guarded 
his neuralgia) and straddled knickered legs and 
squared jacket-sleeved elbows knowingly at the 
Gleam’s wheel. 

It appeared that on some lake whose locality 
was vague Brother Emerson had steered motor- 
boats. But the lake could not have been an im¬ 
portant one, the handy-man thought, for though 
the doughty helmsman knew how to lay a course 
and stick to it he knew nothing at all about 
charted channels and blithely slid to port of a red 
87 


88 LIGHTS ALONG TEN LEDGES 


buoy as they came out of harbor. He was, how¬ 
ever, intensely interested when the handy-man 
pointed out the arrangement of beacons, bell, spar 
and can buoys that make safe for mariners 
this dangerous entrance to one of the best and 
most beautiful harbors on the New England 
coast. 

“ You’ll see as we get toward Maine,” Tom 
promised, “ the marvelous system of lights. No 
such lights anywhere on the coast as between 
Minot and Grand Minan. When you consider 
the miles of coastline, east and west, this country 
has and the millions it costs the government to 
make the seaways safe for traffic, wouldn’t it be 
a picayunish yachtsman who rebelled at paying 
the tax on his boat? ” 

“ Gracious, is there a tax? Is it much? ” 

“ You didn’t know that—you, the owner of this 
boat? ” 

“ I haven’t owned it very long. In fact,” airily, 
“ my trustee attends to all that. I don’t bother. 
Now, let’s see: ‘principal channels have nun- 
buoys; secondary channels can-buoys; minor 
channels spar-buoys ’—that right? ” 

“ Splendid.” Tom smiled into the brown eyes. 
They were getting on famously. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 89 

“ And the funny barber-pole buoys with stripes 
—what about them? ” 

“You go round them, either way; they mark 
obstructions in the channel-■” 

“ What about this yacht coming in? ” 

“ Perfectly all right. Just keep well to star¬ 
board. If she signals, answer her.” 

The helmsman looked helpless. 

“ Give her one whistle to show you understand,” 
said Tom. “Always answer with the same 
signal.” 

“ But suppose I don’t choose to pass to star¬ 
board? ” 

“ You’d have to show a very good reason.” 

The small head in the plaid golf cap was tossed 
upward. “ I always have a good reason and I 
don’t always want to do things.” 

“ Did you ever drive a car? ” asked Tom. 

“ Often.” 

“Well, when the fellow in front of you puts 
out his hand, warning you to slow up, you don’t 
push ahead, do you? ” 

His companion chuckled. “ If I think he’s try¬ 
ing to hold the road, I do. I smashed my fender 
once that way.” 

Served her right, thought Tom. “ Well, you are 


90 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

supposed to handle a boat much as you do a car. 
Recognize the other fellow's signals and yield him 
the courtesy of the road. Want me to take the 
wheel while we pass this chap? " 

“ No, thank you." 

The yacht coming in was speeding toward them, 
a fast cruiser with brasses twinkling in the sun. 

“ Why doesn't he whistle? " 

“ He thinks it unnecessary. There's plenty of 
room to pass." 

“I'm going to make him whistle." Mischief 
gleamed in the brown eyes. A swift twist of the 
wheel and the Gleam swung to port almost across 
the channel. With a smothered exclamation Tom 
lunged forward, grabbed the wheel and gave a 
sharp blast of the whistle in answer to the on¬ 
coming yacht's imperative signal. 

As the two cruisers swept past each other Tom 
saw an irate yachtsman leaning from his bridge 
with binoculars focussed on the Gleam . The 
MacLeod face was crimson. 

“ There's no need of looking so furious," mur¬ 
mured Brother Emerson. “ I only wanted to 
make him whistle—and crowd him a little. He 

had plenty of room to turn out-” 

Plenty of room! With a rock there to star- 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 91 

board of him and high tide covering all but that 
top of it that shows. Pretty business if Pd run 
him on that submerged reef-" 

“ If I had, you mean/' The slim figure in the 
boy's suit drew itself up and Tom was favored 
with a cool glance. “I don't know why you 
should take any of my responsibility. It's my 
yacht, isn't it? " 

Tom shut his teeth together. To be thus led 
along with genial pleasantries and then smartly 
reminded that he was merely the handy-man! 
Well, he wouldn't be lured off his dignity like that 
again. 

“ Isn't it? " repeated a soft voice by his side. 

“ It is, sir." 

From beneath long lashes brown eyes peeped 
at him. “ You're easily teased, aren't you, Tom? " 
whispered a laughing voice. 

And neither one of them was thinking at the 
moment how extraordinarily unmasculine were 
Brother Emerson's tactics. 

Presently, while the handy-man stood at the 
Gleam's wheel, eyes frigidly ahead, a penitent 
voice murmured: 

“ I'm sorry, Tom. Please let me steer, won't 
you? " 


92 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


“ Very well, sir. 7 ' 

“And don’t be so ill-tempered . . . why 

don’t you light up your pipe? I know you’d be 
happier.” 

Tom knew he would too, but he also knew 
enough about the proprieties not to smoke beside 
his employer on the bridge. Another yacht was 
coming up the channel. This one the Gleam 
passed sedately and without a quiver from her 
course. 

They had passed Cat Island and the Gooseber¬ 
ries and Tom pointed out ahead of them the 
Eastern Point lighthouse on the southernmost tip 
of Cape Ann. “ We can run well outside to-day,” 
he decided. “Sea’s like a mill-pond. Pretty 
soon we shall pass Thatcher’s twin lights and then 
run straight for the Isles of Shoals—unless you’d 
like to put in to Gloucester harbor for lunch? ” 

Frances and Cousin Phoebe voted for Gloucester 
but Brother Emerson informed them decisively 
that the plan was to get straight on, as far as they 
could toward the island goal by nightfall. Tom 
didn’t care though he thought it a pity for them 
to miss Gloucester. For himself it was enough to 
be moving across summer seas in the good old 
Vagabond. He felt happier than he had in 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 93 


months. The gay young voices beside him were 
comforting after his loneliness and the sense of 
responsibility for the yacht and its party was 
stimulating. They were making good time and 
ought to reach Portland well before dark. And 
to-morrow they would be at Monhegan. 

But by one o’clock he began to worry about the 
weather. He didn’t like the look of it. Not for 
a long run to Portland. Tom had stood at the 
wheel of the Vagabond for hours at a time but 
always old Saunders had been in charge of the 
yacht, directing the course. Maine harbors are 
ticklish places to get into unless one is sure of his 
channels and the more good daylight the skipper 
can count on, the better. Tom got out the charts 
and studied them intently. 

“ There ought to be another one of Portland 
harbor,” he remembered, eyes searching in the 
locker. “A chart torn across the middle-” 

“ There is one like that down in the cabin,” 
spoke up Cousin Phoebe. “ I was going to throw 
it away. I saw it while I was tidying up here 
yesterday and thought it wasn’t any good.” 

“Will you get it, Frances, please?” Brother 
Emerson’s voice had a crisp note, at the wheel. 
Frances brought the chart and spread it out on 


94 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

the table in front of the wheel. Sure enough, 
there was a long tear down the middle of the chart. 
Tom inwardly cursed his unguarded tongue but 
since nobody made any comment on his slip he 
devoutly hoped it had passed unnoticed. 

A little later when he was slapping sandwiches 
together in the galley (with one eye out of a port 
for he had not unlimited confidence in his helms¬ 
man) he heard a conversation on the bridge above. 
The speakers evidently did not realize how much 
their voices had to be raised above the hum of the 
engine. 

“ Phoebe, have you had him in the cabin for 
anything? ” 

“ Why should I, dearie? We attend to the tidy¬ 
ing up in the cabins ourselves.” 

“ I thought perhaps you might have called him 
in for something.” 

“ No, I didn’t—why, Em? ” 

“ Nothing. But he hasn’t any business in the 
cabin, you know.” 

“What’s the matter, Em?” asked Frances. 
“ Anything wrong? ” 

“Fran, didn’t you notice? He had seen that 
chart before. Phoebe carried it down to the cabin 
yesterday before he came aboard.” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 95 

“ Em! you don’t suppose he could have been 
sent by-■” 

“ Ssh—I don’t know. I can’t think there has 
been time for that. But you two be mighty care¬ 
ful what you say before him-” 

“ Good land! ” complained Cousin Phoebe, “ as 
if my tongue wasn’t half paralyzed now, turnin’ 
off things I start to say and then recollect I 
mustn’t.” 

“ And until I’m sure,” continued the lovely con¬ 
tralto of Brother Emerson, “ I’m not going into 
any harbors he suggests first. We’ll pick out har¬ 
bors he doesn’t mention—we can study those 
charts as well as he can. And we won t stay 
long enough to give him a chance to do any tele¬ 
phoning on shore.” 

Frances sighed. “ Oh, dear! I liked him so 
much-■” 

Contralto came back at that. “ I like him too— 
a lot. But I’m not going to take chances. It’s 
too serious.” 

The handy-man, tripping awkwardly and audi¬ 
bly on the steps, appeared with a plate of sand¬ 
wiches and a tray of iced coffee glasses. 

“ Tom, what shore is that over there? An 
island? ” Brother Emerson pointed eastward. 


96 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

“ It’s no shore.” Tom had taken the wheel and 
was looking, himself, a bit anxiously out to the 
place where sky and sea met. “That's fog. 
Heavy fog too, ready to roll in after the sun goes 
down.” 

“ Why, it's a perfect day,” objected Cousin 
Phoebe. 

“Hazy,” pronounced the handy-man. “And 
getting thicker every minute too. To tell you the 
truth,” he looked about at them all, “ unless you 
people are particularly anxious to make Portland 
to-night I'd strongly advise running back to 
Marblehead, or putting in to Gloucester harbor 
and lying over until to-morrow morning.” 

“ I will not.” The manly voice of Brother 
Emerson rose dangerously near a feminine squeak. 

“ But dearie,” Cousin Phoebe glanced apprehen¬ 
sively at the low gray line off to eastward, “ you 
wouldn't want to run into danger-” 

“ Danger—piffle! A little fog. If our experi¬ 
enced man who claims to be perfectly capable of 
running this boat—I believe that was your claim 
yesterday, Tom?—is afraid of a slight mist-” 

“ Won't be any slight mist,” asserted Tom to 
whom this taunt was naturally unpleasant. “ Un¬ 
less I am much mistaken that is heavy fog hang- 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 97 

ing out there and I'm not keen about risking the 
long run to Portland in any fog.” 

“ Whose risk is it—yours or mine?” The 
Gleam's owner looked gently at the unfortunate 
employee. 

“Em, do consider what Tom says,” begged 
Frances nervously. “You said you would give 
him full charge of running the boat. We don’t 
know anything about ocean fogs-” 

The brown eyes flashed a warning at Frances. 
“ Why don’t we? I for one know all about ocean 
fogs and I can see this one doesn’t amount to 
anything. We’ve started for Portland and I’m 
going to Portland. I’ll take the wheel now, Tom. 
You can go below and eat your lunch.” 

“ Very well, sir,” said the handy-man. “ You 
will pick up Isles of Shoals presently—unless the 
haze gets too thick.” 

As Tom turned from the wheel Frances tossed 
part of her sandwich toward Ming. The bit of 
bread flew down the steps to the deck and the 
little dog, leaping after his tidbit, lost his footing, 
slid across the deck and under the rail, and as the 
yacht rolled on a long ground swell, over went the 
Peke into the sea. 

“Ming! Ming! Oh, my little dog!” The 


98 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

girl who had lately been so imperious darted to the 
rail of the bridge, anguish in her voice. Without 
one instant’s consideration and before anyone had 
an inkling of her mad intention she had leaped 
into forty fathoms of Atlantic ocean. 


CHAPTER X 


People unacquainted with the northern Mas¬ 
sachusetts coast have no conception how cold the 
sea can be there in summer time. Its tempera¬ 
ture, even in mid-August and along the sun- 
warmed beaches seldom rises above sixty degrees, 
and frequently registers less than fifty-four. Tom 
knew that in this early month of summer the 
water, so far out from shore, would be of an icy 
coldness that might well imperil the strongest 
swimmer. 

His first impulse, of course, was to leap over¬ 
board to the assistance of the girl, but he realized 
that with no one controlling the yacht there would 
be small chance for swimmers in the water. He 
must not only get to her as quickly as possible but 
must also have the yacht where he could put her 
speedily back on board. Fervently he wished for 
another man, or for an experienced yachtswoman. 
Cousin Phoebe and Frances were worse than use¬ 
less in the emergency. The stout lady, with 

clutching hands, was hanging over the rail and 
99 


100 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

shrieking incoherently. And Frances clinging to 
his arm was demanding frantically why he did not 
stop the yacht. What was he doing—leaving 
Emily to drown? 

The Gleam had already run some distance past 
the spot where the girl had struck the water. 
Struggling in the foamy wake behind them she did 
appear in hapless plight and without much chance. 
But Tom had seen instantly that she was an ex¬ 
pert swimmer. He thanked his stars for that. 
With tight-set teeth he was swinging the yacht in 
a circle. He flung off the clutching grip of 
Frances. 

“ Stop that screaming. Listen to me: can you 
and your cousin get that tender off the davits and 
into the water? ” 

“ I don’t know/’ wailed Frances. And—from 
Cousin Phoebe at the rail, “ She’s sinking. Emily’s 
sinking. Oh, do something! ” 

“ Of course you can’t,” snapped Tom. “ Then 
do this: get the port life-buoy. Cut the lashings. 
Do you hear me? Keep hold of yourself; it de¬ 
pends on you as much as on me. Get that buoy 
free—do you understand? ” 

Stooped over his wheel with eyes straining 
through the thickening mist at the small, dark 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 101 

speck now ahead as the Gleam came up on the 
new course, Tom turned for a brief second and 
held the distraught gaze of Frances with his steady 
gray glance. She nodded. 

“ Then run to the bow where that coil of rope 
is. Tie one end of the rope to the buoy and make 
the rope fast to the rail. When we come opposite 
her throw the buoy as far as you can. Then watch 
and be ready to do what I tell you next.” 

Frances nodded again, this time competently, 
and ran aft toward the big canvas-covered life¬ 
buoy that hung at the port side. They were head¬ 
ing straight toward the swimmer now. She was 
moving very little in the water; just enough Tom 
thought to keep her blood from congealing, and at 
intervals she was treading water and gazing to¬ 
ward the oncoming yacht. Tom’s heart leaped at 
her skill and strength. A game little sport as well 
as a splendid swimmer, that girl. 

“ Ready! ” 

Tom shouted to Frances who was standing with 
the life-buoy balanced across the rail. He re¬ 
versed his engine. Shut it off. And as the yacht 
shivered to a stop almost in her own length, he 
plunged overboard. 

“ iVe got Ming,” gasped the girl as he came up, 


102 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


pushing ahead of him! the floating buoy. “ I 
thought you’d never come.” 

“ I’m here,” said Tom and his arm went strongly 
round her and around the limp little dog clutched 
in her arm. “ Steady now. You’re all right. Put 
your hand on the buoy—that’s the girl. Let me 
do the work. You’re all right now-” 

“ I’m so co-o-old.” 

“ I know. But you’re going to be all warm and 
comfy in a minute. Buck up now. You’re a 
brave little girl.” 

Then he roared to Frances. “ Never mind haul¬ 
ing in. Get the steps down. Steady does it. 
That’s right. Good girl. . . .” 

It was a very meek Brother Emerson who stag¬ 
gered, supported by the handy-man’s arm, aboard 
the Gleam. Quite obviously, in the clinging, 
soaked garments no boy at all but a very collapsed, 
badly frightened slip of a girl. The big cap had 
long since been washed from her head and closely 
coiled hair dragged from its fastenings. It hung, 
soaked and dripping, below her waist. Frances 
and Cousin Phoebe had their arms about her in¬ 
stantly with feminine pettings and purrings about 
her bravery and her foolishness. 

“ Em, darling,” chattered Frances, almost hys- 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 103 

terical between tears and laughter, “will you 
never learn to think, before you do the first thing 
that comes into your head? Tom could have 
rescued Ming.” 

Emily, leaning against the side of the deck 
house, cuddled the dog in her arms. “ He’s almost 
dead,” she whimpered. “His little body is so 
c-cold.” 

Here the handy-man took charge. “ Get her be¬ 
tween blankets and if you have a drop of whiskey 
aboard now’s the time to use it. A good big 
swig of it. I’m going to let the boat drift a bit 
while I make some hot coffee. Don’t waste a 
minute; get her warm somehow and into bed.” 

He turned to run toward the galley but a wet 
little hand caught at his arm. Brown eyes looked 
up into his. 

“ Tom—I’m sorry. And—and please take us 
back to Marblehead for to-night.” 

“ Right,” agreed the handy-man. And dashed 
for his galley. 

By the time the Gleam slipped into the chan¬ 
nel south of Cat Island the fog had come rolling 
in, a dense gray curtain that shut out the Beverly 
shore and dimmed the nearer vista of trees and 
lawns on Marblehead Neck. When he swung 


104 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


round the harbor buoys he could just make out a 
white wash of surf on jagged rocks to port. He 
breathed a sigh of relief when he had the anchor 
over and the Gleam swung safely round into posi¬ 
tion. Swede or Jap or whosoever for room-fellow, 
he was not going to take that yacht out again 
without efficient help on board. 

Of course they ought to have put in at Glouces¬ 
ter. All foolishness, the hour’s run back to 
Marblehead. But even while expressing contri¬ 
tion for her witless escapade and thanking him 
with her eyes for saving her from its consequences 
she had not trusted him enough to let him choose 
the overnight anchorage. A perverse and wilful 
girl. And spoiled! Not the sort of girl Tom Mac¬ 
Leod admired at all. He liked frank, outspoken, 
sensible girls—comradely girls with no nonsense 
about them. Like that Frances one for instance. 
She wouldn’t have been fool enough to leap into 
the Atlantic ocean for a Peke dog that could have 
been picked up with a boat hook. 

How lovely Miss Puzzled was though. In that 
red Chinese coat the night his torch had flashed 
over her. And to-day, wet garments a-cling and 
hair all dank and dark around her little white face 
as she whispered “ I’m sorry.” How soft and 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 105 

pliant and little her body had felt in his arms and 
how she had yielded herself to him out there in 
the sea. Her arms had gone around his neck (he 
could feel them clinging now!) when he carried 
her up the steps. 

And how she loved her dog. Not a thought of 
self when the thing dear to her was imperiled. 

And her mischievous laugh at his glum inability 
to take what she meant as teasing in tolerant 
spirit. But pulling a yacht across channel at a 
ticklish moment as a joke! He could have shaken 
her—until her eyes had sought his with penitent 
appeal. 

No, she was a fascinating bit of femininity but 
not his kind of girl. Too impetuous and too 
spoiled. Sweetness didn’t cut any figure with him 
unless there was good sense behind it. She was 
sweet only to get her own way. She had probably 
been the kind of little girl who nagged for 
attention: “ Mother. Mother. Mother! . . . 
Mother dear” And got what she was after. 
There had been a kid like that on the steamer 
coming over and Tom had hated her. 

He changed his wet clothes for dry ones and 
was glad to warm up in the galley, preparing 
dinner. No complications to-night; the handsome 


106 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


porterhouse and sliced potatoes browning in 
butter sent savory odors wafting through the 
yacht. 

Frances came to the swing door of the galley 
and carried laden trays to the aft cabin. Ports 
were closed against the chill dampness outside and 
the cabin was bright and cozy with rose-shaded 
lights. 

To the handy-man who, astride a .camp-stool, 
was making away with the tail of the porterhouse 
and a pint of hot coffee, came Cousin Phoebe with 
announcement that after he had finished washing 
up here his presence was desired in the cabin. 

“ Now what? ” cogitated Tom as he rattled the 
last piece of table silver into a drawer. He went 
forward to his cubby in the bow, slicked his hair 
and gave careful attention to his hands and then 
walked aft along the slippery deck to the cockpit. 
Voices on other yachts had a muffled sound and 
the anchor lantern on the mast gave but a dim 
saffron glow. But it was snug and safe here in 
harbor. Tom felt very thankful that he was not, 
at this moment, picking a precarious way around 
Cape Elizabeth and squinting into the murk to 
discover Portland Head Light. 

He knocked at the door of the cabin and Cousin 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 107 

Phoebe’s voice bade him come in. She was sitting 
under one of the lamps busy with a piece of 
needlework, the bit of sheer linen awkwardly held 
by fingers of the bandaged arm while the other 
hand expertly wielded her needle. Frances was 
curled on the port transom with a book. But Tom 
scarcely saw either of them. His eyes went 
straight to the girl on the starboard transom. Not 
Brother Emerson in the boy’s suit and cap but 
Miss Puzzled in her coral and gold mandarin 
jacket. 

Wrapped in the gorgeous Chinese coat she made 
a vivid picture against the dark walnut paneling 
behind her. Her face was in shadow but the light 
of the swinging lamp struck coppery gleams in the 
long braids that trailed into her lap and brought 
out the red and gold of her negligee. A deep- 
toned rug was spread across her knees and on the 
rug her hands were folded. Ming, snoozing com¬ 
fortably, was beside her. 

“ Shut the door, Tom,” she directed, “ and 
please sit down, won’t you? ” 

The handy-man obediently dropped on a cush¬ 
ioned bench at one side of the companion,—and 
not one of the feminine eyes fixed on him but re¬ 
marked the way he did it. Not at all as one of 


108 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


his humble station might be expected to seat him¬ 
self when suddenly bidden by his employer. 

“Now, Tom/' said'the girl in the mandarin 
coat, “ you are on this boat for some purpose. 
I want to know what it is.” 


CHAPTER XI 


That abrupt order to explain his business was 
not at all what Mr. MacLeod had expected. 

Graceful thanks perhaps for his rescue stunt of 
the afternoon he had anticipated. Or maybe 
apologetic explanation of the Brother Emerson 
disguise. Perhaps the whole story confided to him 
with appeal to his chivalrous protection. Instead 
he was bluntly informed that he was an object 
of suspicion. 

But in the unsmiling gaze fixed on him there 
seemed to be something wistful. She wanted to 
believe in him, her eyes said. Tom gave her back 
straight look for straight look. 

“ I told you last night, Miss Jameson—I sup¬ 
pose I may say ‘ Miss Jameson 9 now-? ” She 

nodded, seeming to brush this aside as unimpor¬ 
tant. “—that I was without funds and took ad¬ 
vantage of your advertisement to land a job.” 

“ You also told me last night that you had never 
been on this boat before.” 

“ Pardon. What you asked, Miss Jameson, was 
whether I had been aboard the Gleam. I said 
no.” 

109 


11Q LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Frances leaned forward from the opposite tran¬ 
som. “And the Vagabond f ” 

“ I have been aboard the Vagabond , yes.” 

“I told you so!” murmured Frances, sitting 
back. 

“ Fran, let me do the talking, please. When 
were you on the Vagabond , Tom? ” 

“ Some years ago. I cruised in her for several 
weeks.” 

“ As an employee? ” 

“ Well, I helped look after the engine and some¬ 
times I took the wheel, and I nipped back and 
forth with the tender-” 

“ Sort of an assistant on board? ” she suggested. 

“ Sort of,” admitted Tom. His glance had lifted 
a fraction of an inch above the girks head. A 
small but perfectly cut swastika was quite plainly 
discernible in the paneling between the ports. 
That was the place. . . . 

“ I asked you ”—a remark was evidently being 
repeated and Tom hastily transferred his atten¬ 
tion from the swastika to his employer—“ whether 
you are willing to swear to me— swear to me that 
you have no personal interest in this yacht.” 

“ How do you mean—personal interest? ” asked 
Tom guardedly. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 111 


“ I mean: do you own this boat? ” 

Tom sat up straight. A ghastly possibility oc¬ 
curred to him. Suppose these women, running 
away from something or somebody, had coolly 
made off with the Vagabond —and Mr. MacLeod 
included in the merry party! He recalled the 
painting activities of yesterday: Vagabond 
painted out and Gleam painted in. And the 
abject terror of his charges when that launch had 
appeared alongside. 

Tom had a queer, gone feeling at the pit of his 
stomach. 

“ Miss Jameson! Am I to understand you do 
not own this yacht and don’t know who does? ” 

Under the stern accusation in his eyes the girl’s 
face suddenly relaxed, dropped some of its anxiety. 

“ I told you he had nothing to do with it,” 
murmured Cousin Phoebe, lifting her work and 
biting off an end of thread. “ Tom, / believe in 
you. Even when you remembered about the torn 
chart I knew there was some explanation.” 

Young Tom thanked the stout lady with a 
glance for her championship. It made him a little 
ashamed. Why should he, in the face of such 
confidence, harbor mean suspicions? Come to 
think of it, his attitude from the moment he had 


112 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

come on board had been suspicious. His eyes 
went back to the girl in the mandarin coat. Poor 
little badgered thing!—anxiety and fear were 
what made her suspicious of him; he had no such 
excuse. 

“ I think,” he told her, “ something is troubling 
you very much. And I am sorry if I have added 
to your concern. I certainly don’t own this boat 
and I have no reason for being here that could 
endanger you in any way. Nobody sent me here. 
I came in answer to your ad. I had the summer 
before me and when I saw a chance to cruise on 
the old Vagabond again I jumped at it. And 
now I am here, if there is any way I can serve 
you I want to. Perhaps,” he smiled at her, “ if 
you will tell me what it is you are afraid of I could 
help you better.” 

Emily Jameson followed every word, eyes on his 
face. Never had he seen such eyes. Wide apart, 
softly dark under their straight brows. But 
haunted eyes, shadowed by more strain and 
worry than a girl so young should have to bear. 

When he had finished she sat back against her 
cushions and for the first time unclasped her 
locked hands. 

“ I can’t tell you all about it, Tom. But I do 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 113 


trust you now. I think the Gleam is my boat. 

I—I hope it is-” 

“ But you are not sure? ” 

“ I know it was my boat. I saw the bill of sale. 
But I am not of age till this September and my— 

my trustee bought the yacht for me-” 

“ When was this? ” 

“ Several months ago. What I am afraid of is 
that quite recently maybe he may have sold the 
boat to somebody else. Could he do that? ” 

“ Doesn't he consult you about investments of 
your money? ” 

“ Why no, he never has—I never bothered. But 
he did know I was crazy to keep the yacht.” 

“ I should think the quickest and best way to 
find out how matters stand would be to write or 
wire him.” Tom had a thought. “ Doesn't he 
know you are on board the yacht? ” 

She looked at Frances, whose expression very 
distinctly said, “ Have a care! ” 

“ You see,” Emily explained to Tom, “he’s in 
Europe, t can’t get in touch with him.” 

“ But how did you get possession of the boat? 
The shipyard people would not give it up to you 

unless they were satisfied it was your boat-” 

“ Oh, I managed that all right,” she assured him, 


114 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

and this time looked at Cousin Phoebe. “ What I 
am afraid of is that the boat may have been sold 
to someone quite recently, after I left—left ” 

“ Left home,” prompted Prances. 

“ After I left home, yes.” 

“ But haven't you papers on board to prove 
that, so far as you know, the yacht is yours? ” 

She looked at Cousin Phoebe again. “ You 
ought to have thought of that.” 

“ Couldn’t think of everything,” mumbled the 
stout lady. 

“ But what reason have you,” Tom asked, “ to 
think the boat has been sold to anybody? ” 

Emily leaned forward and dropped her voice. 
“ Two nights ago, in Boston harbor, somebody 
came aboard the yacht. Cousin Phoebe had not 
joined us then-” 

“ And you two girls were alone on board! ” 

“ Oh, I scared him off—with my revolver. He 
went fast enough. But it wasn’t a pleasant ex¬ 
perience.” 

“I should say not!” declared Mr. MacLeod 
indignantly. “ Did—did you get a look at his 
face? ” 

“ No, our lights were out and he crouched be¬ 
hind an electric torch. We thought he was just a 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 115 

sneak thief. But afterward it came to me that he 
had tried to open the cabin door with a key. 
That set me thinking. And he said a very queer 

thing- 

“ What was that? ” 

“ He said something about its being his boat. 
After he had gone I began to wonder if he could 
be someone my—my trustee had sold the boat to. 
Then you came aboard and we could see you were 
not a real handy-man at all; and those melon 
spoons and the torn chart showed us plainly that 
you had been on the yacht before . . . well, 

you see, Tom, I couldn’t help being worried. ,, 

The best way to meet all this seemed with a 
hearty laugh. So thereupon Mr. MacLeod 
laughed right heartily—though his chortle, to 
himself, sounded a trifle hollow. “ I give you my 
word, Miss Jameson,” he said, “ that I haven’t the 
money to buy this boat even if it was offered to 
me. I have a job waiting for me September 
fifteenth; until that time,” he smiled around at 
them, “ I hope to take good care of you so we 
can all enjoy a jolly cruise.” 

Emily still had a worried look. “ But that man 

in the launch this morning-” 

“ I'm pretty sure that chap was a newspaper 


116 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


reporter after harbor notes. If anybody has 
bought the boat, unknown to you, hell come after 
it in a more direct way—and hell have to prove 
his claim. Meanwhile I would strongly advise 
your getting in touch with your trustee, or with 
his office if he is in Europe, and finding out ex¬ 
actly how matters stand.” 

Tom rose, since Emily had risen as though to 
end the interview. 

“ There is something I want to ask,” he added. 
“Would you people be willing to have another 
man on board? ” 

His employer frowned. “ What for? ” 

“ This is a pretty big boat for one person to 
handle-” 

“ I thought,” she was still frowning, “ it was 
what they call a 1 one man control ’ -” 

“ The engine is. And probably one man could 
run the engine and also attend to the mooring if 
there happened to be a quiet sea and he had 
plenty of room. But something might happen 
again,—like to-day, or we might strike a bad 
storm. I’d feel safer to have help on board for a 
long cruise. Even a young lad would do, any¬ 
body who could hop about and be able to take the 
wheel in an emergency. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 117 


“ You can take his pay out of my wages,” sug¬ 
gested Tom as she hesitated. 

Nonsense, she said to that. The money did not 
matter; it was the delay about getting off while a 
helper was hunted up. Tom said he could run 
down to Boston next morning and find somebody, 
but this plan was sharply negatived by his 
charges. They would not be left alone on the 
yacht. So it was decided that Tom should try 
to pick up someone in Marblehead. Plenty of 
kids around sixteen who’d come along almost for 
nothing and be tickled to death at the chance, 
Tom told them. The main thing, his employer 
stated, was to get away from here by noon so they 
could make Portland before dark. 

“Wait a minute,” she halted the handy-man 
as he was about to start up the companion steps, 
“ I’m coming out on deck with you, Tom. I want 
a word with you.” 

She walked ahead of Tom to the bridge. So 
thick hung the fog curtain that they were all but 
invisible to each other. The yacht rocked on the 
long ground-swell and the anchor lantern on the 
mast was an orange blur behind luminous drifting 
mist. 

She wanted to thank him, she said, for what he 


118 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

had done that day. She didn’t know why she had 
attempted such a senseless thing as to leap over¬ 
board. “ I’m always doing things like that,” she 
confessed,—“ anything I want to do at the minute, 
and then being sorry afterward because it puts 
somebody else in difficulty. All I thought of to¬ 
day was Ming. He—he does mean so much to 
me.” 

Tom made light of the matter. “ I could have 
been with you five seconds after you struck the 
water if there had been anybody on board to 
handle the boat. I knew you could not keep up 
for long in that icy water, even though you swim 
so well, and if I had left the yacht without any¬ 
body to stop her engine or bring her around-” 

“ I understand that. If it weren’t for you I’d 
be at the bottom of the Atlantic right now- 

“ And I wish I were! ” she finished. “ I wish I 
were! ” 

“ Miss Jameson-” 

She got hold of herself instantly. “ OH, things 
will work out some way,” she said. He could not 
see, in the fog, but he thought she was wiping her 
eyes. After a minute she spoke again. “ I won’t 
go back. Nobody can make me. Tom!—take 
me to that island where I’ll be safe for a while. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 119 

They’ll come, I suppose, but I want to have a 
little time to think out what to do, before they 
find me. That’s why I took the yacht. I knew— 
out at sea, I’d be safe for a while. I can’t tell you 
about it, Tom-” 

“ It’s none of my business,” Tom answered 
quietly. “ I just want to know what to look out 
for, that’s all. There is something you are afraid 
of, beside a possible purchaser of the boat turn¬ 
ing up? ” 

“ Something much worse. Something”—she 
spoke through shut teeth—“more than I could 
bear.” 

“Whatever it is,” assured Mr. MacLeod vali¬ 
antly, “ I won’t let it come near you.” 

Her voice came to him, very low. “ I’ll tell you 
why I changed the yacht’s name to Gleam. It’s 
because I hope to find, on this cruise—within the 
next few weeks, some gleam of light to show me 
the way in a terribly dark place. Will—will you 
help me, Tom? ” 

“You bet I will! ” said young Tom MacLeod 
earnestly. 

Thus it was that again to-night two hands 
touched in seal of cordial good fellowship. 

He was guiding her along the fog-soaked deck 


120 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

under the galley window and cautioning her to be 
careful about slipping when suddenly she paused, 
hands clinging to the rail, and laughed softly. 

“You see I know you didn’t happen on this 
boat by chance, Tom.” 

“ I saw the ad-” 

“ Yes, and I saw something else.” She slid her 
hand along the rail to where his left hand rested. 
They were directly below the riding lantern now 
and were dimly visible to each other. 

“ This,” she said, and touched with a finger-tip 
the ring Tom was wearing,—an unusual ring with 
an ovalof deep blue lapis entwined in silver ser¬ 
pents. He had picked it up in India for Cliff. 

“ I saw that ring on a hand beckoning to me 
through some Pullman berth curtains.” 

Mr. MacLeod was speechless. 

“ They don’t know.” She moved her head in 
the direction of the aft cabin. “ I wonder myself 
why I didn’t tell them at once—but I didn’t. At 
first I was worried. When you came aboard yes¬ 
terday I was afraid you might be somebody sent 
to spy on me and that you had been following 
me in the train. I decided the best thing, as long 
as you were here, was to keep you aboard a while 
and find out for sure.” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 121 

“ And are you sure now? ” 

She nodded gravely. 

“ Yes, I’m sure now.” Then she laughed mis¬ 
chievously. “You see I understand it was all 
your deep interest in—Ming.” 

“ Exactly.” Tom’s eyes twinkled too. “ Growlo 
it was. After he took such a fancy to me I simply 
couldn’t give him up.” 


CHAPTER XII 


Tom and the Peke, next morning, stretched their 
legs on Marblehead Neck. It was pleasanter to 
swing along over the hard, wide roads than to 
blunder through the tortuous streets of old Mar¬ 
blehead, for the fog still hung thick and nothing 
twenty feet away was clearly visible. Tom wore 
his oilskin slicker and occasionally Growlo rode in 
its deep pocket. They had climbed the stairs 
from the ferry dock and cut down past the Eastern 
Yacht Club clear to the causeway, then back along 
the seaward side where gardens of fine estates, on 
a brighter day, would have shown blazing patches 
of color against a background of far-stretching 
sea. 

But this morning the ramblers and roses and 
petunia borders were dim, as though layers of 
misty gray chiffon had been flung over them, and 
except for the smash of breakers against the cliffs 
there was no hint of the wide-stretching Atlantic. 
Tom had a love of wild and desolate places, of 
being alone in them. He enjoyed big things— 

mountains at sunset, dawn on the sea, stars at 
122 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 123 


night, better that way than with a companion who 
had not the gift of silence, and like most people 
whose lives have been lonely got things out of 
solitude that the gregarious never know. 

He climbed down to a ledge that ran out under 
the shelter of a giant cliff, lighted his pipe and sat 
for an hour watching the boil and fret of the sea 
against the rocks. Tons of sea, roaring, tearing 
in; washing over boulders that lifted sleek black 
crowns out of the receding waters to be immedi¬ 
ately engulfed again. Green, fearfully deep look¬ 
ing seas heaving up in chasms among the cliffs and 
then withdrawing in swirls of sudsy foam. Giant 
waves that crashed against the unconquerable 
granite, clouds of spray shooting thirty feet in air. 

Tom, motionless, smoked his pipe and reassured 
with comforting ear-scratchings small Growlo who 
slunk, terrified, in the depths of the slicker pocket. 

What must she have thought, knowing all the 
time about that ring, when he appeared as an ap¬ 
plicant for the handy-man job? Lucky for him 
that she had not recognized him that night he 
climbed aboard in Boston harbor—had not sus¬ 
pected him of being that sort of bounder in his 
effort to get acquainted. His applying for the 
job of handy-man had merely amused her. Of 


124 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


course a girl like that, as beautiful as she was, 
would be used to having chaps follow her, trying 
to scrape acquaintance. He hadn't been offensive 
in that way and his willingness to accept the 
humble position of employee on her yacht in order 
to be near her she took as a sort of tribute that 
didn’t surprise her in any way. She was amused 
by it! Sure of herself. Sure of her charm. A 
rich girl, spoiled. Accepting adoration as her due. 
She took it as a piece of luck probably that his 
adoration had brought him along as so timely a 
protector. 

She could make use of him and he could go on 
adoring—but at a proper distance. She had 
hardly spoken to him this morning when he had 
waited on her at breakfast. Toting grub up to 
the bridge—sort of outdoor picnic suggestion— 
was one thing; waiting on an indoor breakfast 
table was another. He wished he could tell these 
people about the real reason for his being aboard 
the yacht. He’d like that girl to know he had a 
reason beyond tagging after herself. But it would 
be disloyal to Celia to confide her secret to these 
chance acquaintances. He wasn’t going to search 
behind that panel in presence of curious eyes. 
Some secret of Celia’s past, sacred to her son, 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 125 

might be concerned. No one must know about 
that message behind the panel but himself. 

The tide was nearing the full and showers of 
icy spray drove Tom from his ledge. He knocked 
out his pipe, climbed to the top of the cliff and 
stood undecided whether to continue his stroll or 
take the road back to the ferry dock where he had 
left his tender. It was only ten o’clock, nothing 
to do aboard until luncheon time and, though the 
fog was lifting a bit, no hope of leaving harbor 
to-day. He might as well get more exercise while 
he had the chance. He swung southward and 
climbed down to a flat beach where breakers were 
rolling up in long lines of surf. Good place for 
Growlo to have a run. 

Growlo had a scramble instead of a run, for the 
beach was not of sand but of stones—most of them 
the size of hen’s eggs. The waves tore up the 
steep incline and withdrew, sucking back the 
giant pebbles with a sound gruesomely like the 
rattle of bones. A dismal enough spot, in this 
fog. Suddenly the Peke, appalling growls pro¬ 
ceeding from his tiny chest, disappeared around a 
jutting corner of cliff. 

“ Hello, Man Friday! ” sang out a plaintive 
voice. Tom hurried after the dog. Close against 


126 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


the cliff sat an extremely desolate looking being: 
a young man, hatless and huddled in wet clothes 
and holding carefully on his knees a tin dispatch 
box. 

“ Gosh,” he said to Tom, “ it’s good to see a 
human being on this desert island.” 

If he hadn’t been so wet and forlorn he would 
have been a personable young chap. Tom noted 
that his clothes were good, if soaked and shapeless. 
The drenched shirt under the soggy coat was of 
silk and a jewel-studded fraternity pin was at¬ 
tached to the shirt. But the wan face had a 
stubble of beard and the young man’s eyes were 
red-rimmed. These eyes peered up at Tom in 
the strained way of near-sighted eyes bereft of 
glasses. 

“ Haven’t a cigarette about you? ” asked the 
youth hopefully. 

“ Sorry, only this pipe. But there’s a shop not 
ten minutes’ walk from here where they have 
plenty.” 

“ The deuce you say. Where on earth ami?” 

“ Marblehead Neck.” 

“ Bor the lovva Mike! ” 

“ What happened to you? ” asked Tom. 

A languid hand directed attention to the beach 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 127 

further along. Piled up on the shingle was the 
wreck of a sailboat. Washing about in the surf 
were bits of torn away rigging. 

“ You lost your boat? ” 

“ See for yourself/’ responded the young man 
dismally. “ Lost my way in that fog yesterday. 
Prowled around looking for a channel till dark 
caught me. Thought I was off Cape Ann some¬ 
where. Then smashed my rudder and the tide 
got me. First thing I knew I was pilin’ up on 
this beach. Lucky for me it was down here and 
not against that bunch of cliffs. Lost my glasses 
but I saved this .” He touched the tin box on 
his knees. “ Must have been flood tide—about 
ten o’clock last night, I guess.” 

“ And you’ve been here ever since? ” 

“ Went to sleep. Kind of all in I was, after I 
climbed out of those billows. Some undertow, my 
word! Been awake an hour or so but my watch 
is on the blink.” He got up stiffly and returned 
Tom’s concerned gaze with a genial grin. “ If 
there’s anybody beside yourself on this fog-bound 
coast, brother, what’s the prospect for a cup of 
coffee and some dry duds? ” 

Something in his grin and in the way he held 
his shoulders as he stood erect made Tom look 


128 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 
at him more closely. “ Say, don't I know 
you? ” 

“ Maybe you do. I'm not famous yet but I'm 
goin' to be. You might have a clairvoyant eye. 

Hello-" he squinted at Tom through the near- 

sighted eyes. “ I do seem to recollect you, old 
bean. Le’s see: football outfit, black and orange 
legs." He smote his forehead. “ Braceley prep! 
You're MacLeod who did that kick back in 

1914-” 

“ And you are-” 

“ Oh, you wouldn't remember me. I was a kid 
freshman and you were a chesty senior. First 
year old Doc Havens was headmaster—remember? 
Top hole you were, lent me your canoe-" 

“ I remember. Young Renny." 

“ Renny it is. What'd you do afterward, Mac¬ 
Leod? Going on to Tech, weren't you? ” 

Tom seized the young man by the arm. “ We 
can chin about all that later. Man, your teeth are 
chattering. Come along now and get something 
hot inside you." 

At the top of the cliff young Renny turned and 
looked back at the hopeless wreck of a sailboat. 

“ The old Skimmer’s a goner.” He sighed. 
“ Dunno what I'll do with my summer now.” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 129 

Following what seemed afterward a heaven¬ 
sent inspiration, Mr. MacLeod put a question: 

“ Say, can you cook? ” 

The castaway could. In fact, he solemnly as¬ 
severated, not even Frenchy at the Waldorf had 
anything on him in the culinary line. 

An affectionate arm was laid across Mr. Renny’s 
shivering shoulders. 

“ You come along with me, my boy. Your sum¬ 
mer’s taken care of.” 


CHAPTER XIII 


“ Of course it's a man,” decided Mr. Renny. 

Warmed and fed and comfortably enjoying a 
cigarette (one of Brother Emerson’s) he reclined 
under a striped Indian blanket on one of the 
bunks in the crew’s cubby and regarded the handy¬ 
man affably. “ What for would she be running 
away and hiding like this—in that bally boy’s 
suit that wouldn’t fool anybody—unless it’s from 
some man? ” 

“ Why a man particularly? ” Tom frowned at 
the idea. “ Why not a hateful stepmother? Or 
an old early-Vic father objecting to some modern 
kind of career? ” 

“ Don’t kid yourself, old boy, that isn’t the 
species of femmynyne who is agonizing after any 
career,—not with those 1 follow-me ’ eyes. And 
why would a girl with income enough to sport a 
boat like this one be worrying about any step¬ 
mother? No, I’m telling you it’s some man.” 

“ Well,” Tom was filling his pipe, “ if it is, she’s 
trying to get away from him.” Comfort in this 
thought 


130 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 131 

Young Renny’s eyes twinkled. So that was 
how the wind set—already! he whispered to him¬ 
self. 

“ Anyhow, MacLeod-■” 

“ Easy on the MacLeod, old chap. Better stick 
to ‘ Tom.’ ” 

“ Tom it is. Anyhow I like the little one best.” 

“ Oh, you do? ” 

“Yep. Not so much cha-arrm maybe, as 
Brown-Eyes, and not near so much pulchritude. 
But better tempered I bet you. And easier man¬ 
aged. And nothing on her mind, either, to keep 
her awake nights. Me for little sister Fran.” 

“ You understand, Renny,” warned the handy¬ 
man, “ we are merely employees on this boat. If 
they are kind enough to be civil and friendly 
to us-■” 

“ I get you.” The Gleam's newly engaged 
steward grinned appreciatively. Then his merry 
eyes became serious again. " I’m not taking it as 
a lark but as an Allah-sent bit of luck to make up 
for the loss of my old Skimmer. And I’m going 
to stand by those three just as much as you are, 
and help ’em any way I can. Besides,” he 
reached over and touched the tin dispatch box 
tenderly, “ I’ll be busy.” 


132 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


There had been a conclave in the aft cabin, 
Brother Emerson presiding; and the castaway in 
a suit of the crew’s (breeches and sleeves well 
rolled up) had related his story. He too, it trans¬ 
pired, was avoiding recognition ashore. Because 
of a clash of opinions, parental determination hav¬ 
ing been set upon a career (beginning at the 
bottom) in the three-generation established 
pickle factory down near Philadelphia, young Mr. 
Renny was for the moment on his own in pursuit 
of art and self-expression. A small avuncular 
legacy received just before his graduation from 
college would, he thought, take him through the 
summer and a congenial itinerant existence had 
been made possible by the possession of a beloved 
sailboat. 

Mr. Renny was writing a play. And parental 
opinion, it seemed, was contemptuous of all such 
avocations and insultingly doubtful about young 
Mr. Renny’s ability in any case. But as the 
potential dramatist pointed out to his good friends 
aboard the Gleam it was only fair for him to have 
a try at it before attaching himself for life to 
pickles. If he did make good, he argued, he could 
bid farewell forever to the loathed prospect of 
pickling. If he didn’t, he would go to work in 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 133 

the factory in September and not much time 
lost. Anyhow he was going to have his chance. 
If the old man caught the playwright he would be 
quite capable of burning up the play, but pursu¬ 
ing a nomadic existence along the waterways of 
far-away Massachusetts young Mr. Renny felt he 
was fairly safe from being nabbed. 

“ When the Skimmer smashed up,” he asserted, 
looking with his nice pleading boy’s eyes at Cousin 
Phoebe whom he had taken to be the presumable 
head of the yacht’s party and arbiter of his fate, 
“ I thought I was done for. I’ve a shack and a 
typewriter up here along the shore a ways, but I 
dassent hang round there daytimes. The old man 
is mighty determined when he goes after anything. 
And it has been his dream to get me in that pickle 
factory since he thanked God for one boy after 
four girls.” 

“ Where are the girls? ” asked Frances inter¬ 
estedly. 

“All married—and not one of their hubbies 
would go in for pickles. I’m Dad’s last hope.” 

“ Couldn’t you,” inquired Cousin Phoebe, 
“ manage to please your father and do your play 
too? I mean: pickle daytimes and write in the 
evening? ” 


134 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


Mr. Renny’s eyes sought the cabin ceiling. 
“ Good Gosh! ” whispered he. 

Here the arbiter of all their fates took hold. 
“ I think he is perfectly right,” insisted Brother 
Emerson. “Everybody has a right to live his 
own life and express himself the way he wants to. 
If old people interfere it’s just their selfishness. 
Mr. Renny, you stay with us on the Gleam and 
finish your play. Where’s that shack and your 
typewriter? ” 

“ Up Indian River—not far from Ipswich.” 

“ Do you know the way, Tom? ” 

“ I can find it,” assured the handy-man, “ ii 
there’s a channel deep enough for the yacht.” 

“ Very well, we’ll stop there to-morrow, on our 
way to Maine. Tom, you can run the yacht and 
Mr. Renny can look after the galley and what¬ 
ever is fair I’ll pay you both. You talk it over 
and decide.” 

“Oh, forget about that part of it,” protested 
Mr. Renny airily. “ It’s a corking lark for me to 
be aboard this yacht — and mighty good of 
you people to take me along. I don’t want 
wages-” 

“But Tom does,” insisted Brother Emerson 
with an unfathomable glance at the handy-man. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 135 

“ Tom says the only reason he is on this yacht is 
because he is broke.” 

Mr. MacLeod rose from the companion steps 
where he had been sitting. “ 1 think a business 
arrangement will be most satisfactory all round. 
Renny, if you'll come with me now I'll show you 
about that galley stove. Sometimes it needs 
coaxing.” 

“ I suppose,” remarked the steward reflectively 
as he manipulated oven draughts and lifted stove 
lids, “ you are thinking it would be safer—in case 
this boat does belong to somebody else and there 
happens to be trouble—for you and me to be just 
paid employees jumpin' round in white ducks? ” 

“ Something like that maybe,” responded the 
handy-man. 

Luncheon clinched the matter, so far as the 
new steward was concerned. Chicken a la King, 
crisp rolls and a salad with Roquefort cheese 
dressing persuaded the thrilled occupants of the 
deck house that this treasure must be retained at 
any price. Mr. Renny's place on the Gleam was 
secure. And the jolly way he handed plates and 
slid up and down the galley steps was most divert¬ 
ing. 

The fog was breaking away now. Shore lines 


136 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


appeared through a luminous silver mist and a 
light breeze ruffled the harbor. Pennants on the 
yachts glowed in brilliant patches of color and 
blue water reflected dancing sunbeams. Tom 
was untying the dinghy’s painter and young 
Penny, now in his dry but badly crumpled suit, 
was coming down the deck from the crew’s cubby 
when Frances sprang up from her chair on the 
bridge. 

“ I’ve simply got to have some exercise. I’m 
going along.” 

Cousin Phoebe looked alarmed and Emily 
turned sharply with evident intent to veto this 
pleasantplan. Then the brown eyes softened and 
gazed wistfully at the Marblehead shore. “ All 
right, Fran, I can’t blame you. But do be care¬ 
ful and if you have the least reason to think—you 
know!—don’t risk coming back here until dark. 
And keep the others with you.” 

Frances dashed to the cabin and returned with a 
handful of letters. She asked Tom if he had a 
large envelope and when he brought it she slipped 
her letters in and borrowing Tom’s fountain pen 
scribbled an address on the envelope. Letters to 
be mailed by somebody from somewhere, was the 
handy-man’s conclusion—which was correct. But 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 137 

Frances posted the en velope herself and he did not 
discover its destination. 

The handy-man had a keen sense of what was 
proper in yacht etiquette (if no one else had) and 
he knew it was not for him, in duck jumper and 
saucer cap, to stroll sociably in company with his 
betters. Though his sailorman's ducks were fresh 
and spotless and the sad habiliments of Mr. 
Renny obviously indicated an overnight set-to 
with something or somebody, Mr. Renny could 
blithely escort the lady into a fascinating gift-shop 
retrieved from an ancient sail loft and lounge be¬ 
side her on a stool at the drug-store soda fountain 
while a humble handy-man waited for parcels to 
be tied up at the grocery. Through the grocery 
window Tom gazed darkly at the joyous two who, 
in front of historic Town Hall, were making no 
secret of their high diversion over the huge “ Wel¬ 
come ” that felicitously adorned (because G. A. R. 
headquarters had a room there) what was now the 
village jail. 

If this Renny was going to be treated as a guest 
aboard . . . 

But Mr. MacLeod's spirit was not the only one 
depressed by the good times of those who could 
have them. A pair of very wistful brown eyes 


138 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

viewed the laughing and chattering pair who came 
up the steps from the tender. 

“ For you/’ mentioned the gallant Mr. Renny, 
dropping a package of chocolates in his employer’s 
lap. Tom, on his way down to the galley with 
two dozen eggs and a cottage ham, caught the 
pleased “Why, how dear of you to remember 
me! ” 

Of course it would be pretty fresh of a handy¬ 
man who but yester-morn had said “ yes, sir,” to 
his employer, to be slipping her chocolates to-day 
. . . but why the dickens hadn’t he thought 
of it? 

“ Say, Renny,” he called crisply from the galley, 
“ since you’re steward on this yacht suppose you 
tote up those potatoes from the tender and stow 
’em away. I’ve other things to do.” 

His temper was not improved by a conversation 
that floated down to him while he tinkered over 
the engine. The hatch at the top of the ladder 
was closed but through the open ports voices on 
the bridge just above were perfectly audible. 

Mr. Renny, evidently loitering in the galley 
doorway, was suggesting that a stop be made at 
Gloucester next day so that he might provide him¬ 
self with wearables matching those of the handy- 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 139 


man. The outfit of college duds up at his shack, 
he pointed out, would not be seemly for one of 
his lowly station in the yacht’s personnel. 

His employer did not seem to approve of this 
excellent idea. “ Don’t you think, Fran,” she 
said, “ it would be sort of pleasant to have one 
man aboard who could be with us aft? People 
wouldn’t wonder, in a harbor, as of course they 
would if a deck hand was sitting round with us. 
Mr. Renny will be busy in the galley at meal-times 
but why shouldn’t he look like a visitor aboard— 
or one of the family? ” 

“And I’d have someone to run about with, 
ashore, now and then.” Frances was enthusiastic 
over the notion. 

“ I don’t approve,” began Cousin Phoebe. “ If 
you ask me, as chaperone of the party I 
think-” 

(Good for Cousin Phoebe, was the approving 
comment that only the Gleam's engine heard.) 

The lovely contralto of Miss Puzzled came 
floating down: “Nobody has asked you, Phoebe. 
You try and look the part of chaperone, that’s all 
that’s expected of you, Phoebe dear.” 

Thus it was that at eventide the handy-man 
pursuing his humble duties on deck—taking down 


140 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

colors, putting up the riding light and such—was 
entertained by the gay voice of Mr. Renny on the 
bridge. Mr. Renny making himself socially agree¬ 
able. Basking in the admiring glances of the 
ladies. Telling college yarns and being rewarded 
for his efforts by appreciative laughter—bright, 
rippling laughter of Frances, hearty giggles of the 
stout lady, and the low, sweet laugh on two notes 
that Tom recognized as Emily’s. He could not 
recall having heard her laugh so much in his two 
days aboard. 

Mr. Renny had a guitar, he said, at the shack 
up Indian River. (He’d been on his college glee 
and mandolin club, it appeared.) They could 
have some jolly musical evenings later when they 
got to more secluded harbors. Mr. Renny also 
could tell fortunes; the handy-man, taking his 
professional good-night look at the engine, 
heard Miss Puzzled being informed that her fate 
was to be a blue-eyed man with literary tenden¬ 
cies. 

“ Pickles!” muttered Mr. MacLeod to the 
magneto. u Penny’s Tomato Relish! A fusser.” 
That was what! 

They invited Tom to join them—when kindly 
dusk offered to make sailorman’s ducks on the 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 141 


bridge less offensively conspicuous—but Mr. Mac¬ 
Leod, pleading important letters to write, retired 
to the crew’s cubby forward. He sneaked up 
through the hatch later and stretched his legs 
along the deck, smoking Cliff’s pipe and trying to 
recapture his contented mood of two nights 
agone. He was on the old Vagabond , wasn’t he? 
With the summer ahead of him? What did these 
people matter? Aliens aboard his Vagabond with 
their foolish prattle and their silly gales of laugh¬ 
ter there on the bridge deck. There had been no 
such disturbing noise on the Vagabond in his day. 
Tom remembered Cliff and Celia murmuring to¬ 
gether in the cockpit and old Saunders spinning 
yarns in his soft voice up here at the bow. Old 
days that would never be any more. 

That girl—he had her sized up now. She was 
the kind that must have attention. “One man 
aboard we can have with us aft.” So long as 
there was nobody else she had kept in practice 
with the handy-man, but of course young Ted 
Renny, just out of college, was nearer her age. 
Kids, both. They knew all the slang and the 
shibboleths of the younger set, grown up since 
Tom’s departure for a man’s work in foreign 
lands. Tom felt very old with his twenty-six 


142 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

years and all he had been through—soldiering in 
France and engineering in India. 

More noise to destroy the peace of the harbor! 
Over at the Corinthian Yacht Club the Friday 
night dance was beginning. Automobiles were 
roaring up the club drive and a fox-trot bleated 
over the water. Back there on the bridge deck 
those youngsters were singing. They would, of 
course. That piping soprano leading the slushy 
tenor of Mr. Renny belonged to Frances. The 
alto—Mr. MacLeod leaned up on an elbow. Some 
voice carrying that alto! You might know that 
girl would have a voice like that. She had every¬ 
thing. Even the Vagabond. Changed it to 
Gleam to show her the way, she’d said. Well, 
whatever way it proved to be, it would be her way. 

There she was now, leaving the party on the 
bridge and going off by herself; standing at the 
starboard rail and gazing at the lighted windows 
of the club house. Wishing she could be over 
there, dancing, no doubt. 

The slim figure in its boyish clothes turned and 
came forward toward the bow. Tom held his 
breath. But the figure seemed to hesitate and 
then moved aft again toward the bridge. Evi¬ 
dently the handy-man was not to be favored this 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 143 

evening. But Tom was sure he heard a sigh that 
was half a sob indrawn between parted lips. He 
must have been mistaken though, for presently he 
heard the soft contralto laugh following some 
absurd sally of Mr. Renny’s. Maybe that girl 
was scared at whatever she had run away from, 
but she wasn't remorseful, at any rate the remorse 
didn't go very deep. 

Mr. Renny, briskly moving about, waked his 
foc'sle mate at midnight. 

“ Curious light, that." 

Tom grouchily hauled his blanket higher. 
“ What light? " 

“ Down there to sou'ard. Funny way it keeps 
flashing: one-four-three—what's it mean? " 

“ How should I know? You ever going to turn 
in?" 

“ But what light is it, Tom? It must be called 
something—a big light like that-" 

The handy-man thumped his pillow over. In 
the muffled tone of one not to be advisedly roused 
from honest slumber he grunted: 

“ Minot Light, that's all.” 


CHAPTER XIV 


Position of skipper on the bridge has strategic 
value. One could, for instance, send Mr. Renny 
to the bow to keep lookout for floating driftwood. 
And if Frances, like so many maidens cruising 
summer seas, elected what Mr. Renny called the 
foc’sle head as the j oiliest place to perch, so much 
the better. Her orange sweater made an attractive 
splash of color against the blue morning sea and 
much laughter and light persiflage was wafted 
back on the morning breeze. Mr. MacLeod 
smiled benevolently. Things seemed to be going 
agreeably this morning and he could not account 
for his uncharacteristic fit of gloom last night. It 
must have been something Mr. Renny cooked for 
dinner. 

Tom, also, was glad to be leaving Marblehead. 
Something disturbing had happened this morning. 
On his way back to the tender after a hurried 
errand ashore for some extra spark plugs he had 
been halted at the ferry dock by a consequential 
sort of chap who asked inquisitive questions about 
the Gleam , her owner’s name, and her destination. 
This one wanted to know also how long the handy- 
144 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 145 

man had been employed on board and whether he 
knew why the yacht carried no club pennant. 

This interrogation Tom decided to keep to him¬ 
self. He meant to tell Ted Renny about it later 
in the safe seclusion of the crew's cubby but there 
was no use, because of anything so indefinite, dis¬ 
turbing the peace of the three women. Anybody 
tracing resemblance to a missing Vagabond in the 
newly painted Gleam would scarcely suggest his 
suspicions to an employee on the Gleam. Cliff 
MacLeod's Vagabond had been a familiar denizen 
of that harbor and curiosity might be the only 
motive for the questioning, but any yacht might 
be sold and its name changed after the death of 
its owner—nothing criminal in that. 

The fact that a yacht of the Gleam's tonnage 
flew no club pennant—sacred shibboleth of clan 
kinship in yachting harbors—was certainly likely 
to cause curiosity. It marked that yacht as an 
alien and an outsider. Tom never looked at the 
Gleam from the water without a sneaking sense 
of embarrassment that there was no club pennant 
flying. Almost he was tempted to get out Cliff's 
New York Yacht Club pennant from the color 
locker and hoist it forward, but prudence re¬ 
strained him. The Gleam had no possible right 


146 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

to the pennant and sorry complications might 
arise if anything disagreeable should turn up 
about ownership of the yacht. 

Well, it was a fine morning and why worry? 
There was business and bustle in the harbor. The 
wonderful marconi rig sloops were getting ready 
for the week-end races; some of them were skim¬ 
ming the harbor like great birds. A big New 
York forty-footer had come in overnight and the 
blue ocean outside the harbor entrance was dotted 
with gay little Cape Cats and funny racing dories 
that looked, Emily said, exactly like fussy mid- 
Victorian old ladies picking their way along with 
tipped up bustles. 

“ You ought to see the place during race week 
in August if you think this is lively,” laughed 
Tom. “ No sailing harbor like Marblehead on the 
coast. They keep their racing sailboats here and 
live in those mansions ashore—turn up their noses 
at our Long Island Sound way of sleeping aboard 
little cabin cruisers and scraping plates out of 
galley windows. But somehow the harbor here 
always looks lonesome to me with all the slim 
masts of the racing boats towering up, and so few 
solid chunks of comfy motor cruisers with lighted 
ports at night. It spells money, this harbor, but 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 147 


it never has the cozy suggestion of Manhasset or 
Larchmont or New Rochelle.” 

Brother Emerson, suitably attired, had the 
wheel again this morning and wore the blithe ex¬ 
pression of one leaving dull care behind. The 
very thrum of the engine had a joyous sound and 
the curve of foamy wake sweeping jauntily round 
the harbor buoys suggested a kicking of glad heels 
at uncongenial shore restrictions. 

Tom pointed to the group of buildings huddling 
on a rock off to starboard. “ Children’s Island. 
Sort of fresh air resort for sick kiddies of Boston. 
Girls from the Neck go over in motor-boats and 
take ’em toys and play with ’em.” 

“ Fresh air enough,” Cousin Phoebe glanced at 
the sun-baked rock, treeless and set in its rim of 
leaping, snowy surf, “ but a desolate sort of place 
for children.” 

Emily’s eyes were shining. “ But look at the 
windows—to let the sun in and the big view of 
sea and clouds and sunsets. And see the nurses— 
their white dresses on that verandlf Oh, how 
glorious for the poor little shut-ins! I wish . . . 
couldn’t we stop, Tom, and see the kiddies? ” 

Then the eagerness went out of her face. “ No, 
I forgot. Of course we can’t.” 


148 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


“You like children?” asked Tom, putting a 
quick hand on the wheel as she looked back wist¬ 
fully to see the last of the breeze-swept island. 

“ She's daft over 'em,” Cousin Phoebe declared. 
“ She ought to have a dozen of her own.” 

“ I used to plan,” Emily was directing her 
course carefully as Tom indicated, well to port of 
Baker's Island with its two gleaming white light¬ 
houses, “ that some day I'd have eight. Four 
boys and four girls. That's a good number, don't 
you think? ” She looked seriously at Tom. 
“ Wouldn't it have been jolly when they all came 
home from school at Christmas time? ” 

“ Splendid,—but what made you change your 
mind? ” And, in reply to her puzzled look, “ You 
said you used to plan.” 

Suddenly and to his complete consternation she 
flung both arms across her face and ran, sobbing, 
down the steps to her cabin. Tom caught the 
wheel as the Gleam's bow twisted dangerously 
toward a surf-fretted rock and Mr. Renny, spring¬ 
ing up with an amazed “Hey! ” stared at the 
bridge. 

Cousin Phoebe came close to Tom at the wheel. 
“ You mustn’t mind Emmie, Tom. She's not her¬ 
self. She's been through an awful lot lately. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 149 

Emmie’s the sunniest girl, quick tempered—yes, 
but not uneven tempered the way she is now. It’s 
only because she’s under a sort of strain. And 
frightened.” Cousin Phoebe glanced at the closed 
door of the cabin. “ She’s frightened every min¬ 
ute except when something makes her forget. But 
this cruise—I don’t know. I don’t know what’s 
to come of it-” 

“ Better just enjoy it.” Tom smiled at the 
plump little lady who truly looked anxious and 
upset. 

“ I never did enjoy sitting on a volcano,” stated 
Miss Phoebe cryptically. 

Tom tried to draw her attention to Hospital 
Point lighthouse across the bay and expressed re¬ 
gret that the ladies could not take this oppor¬ 
tunity to explore quaint old Salem. But Miss 
Phoebe was not to be diverted. She was the type 
of femininity that always has to seek direction of 
the nearest available member of a presumably 
stronger and wiser sex and she liked Tom’s quiet¬ 
ness and lack of flippancy. He did not seem like 
one of the hard hearted younger generation that 
nonchalantly dismissed elderly apprehensions. 

“ There isn’t a bigger hearted girl than Emmie 
anywhere,” she persisted. “ I want to tell you 


150 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

something: for years and years that child has been 
giving a regular weekly amount to a—a relative 
of hers who hasn't enough to live on. And her 
own allowance isn't very big either. She has 
sacrificed clothes and luxuries and things girls love 
to help out this—this relative. And never telling 
a soul. That’s the kind of girl Emmie is! " 

Tom wondered if Cousin Phoebe might be the 
relative. She was flushed and her eyes were 
bright and misty as she looked out over the morn¬ 
ing sea. “ And there’s Ming/' she added. “ Night 
after night Emmie has slept in a car out in the 
garage with that dog because they wouldn't let her 
have the little fellow in the house and he cried so, 
in the garage all alone. No one could blame her 

for-" The stout lady caught herself up. 

“ Did she say where we are going after that island, 
Tom? " 

“ Not to me." Tom carefully picked his course, 
eyes on the intricate channel ahead. He was sure 
his employer would disapprove of these confi¬ 
dences. To his relief, Emily herself appeared, 
coming along the deck from the cockpit. She had 
changed from the boy's clothes into a white linen 
frock and a scarlet flannel sport coat. For the 
first time Tom saw her hair dressed girlishly and 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 151 

without the disfiguring cap of Brother Emerson. 
The rippling chestnut tresses were drawn back 
from her beautiful forehead and the ends made 
into great coils over her ears, and the simple ar¬ 
rangement seemed to suit her, lending a sweet 
dignity to the small head. 

Tom gave up the wheel and called her attention 
to the famous picture post-card effect of Magnolia, 
far ahead on the high, wooded shore; creamy 
stucco cottages above ochre and green tones of the 
bluff and below, the brilliant blue of the ocean. 
“Sometime you must see it from the shore; the 
tea rooms and the smart shops with frocks and 
fans and jewelry displayed in windows under an 
arcade that shades the street.” 

The brown eyes viewed distant Magnolia list¬ 
lessly. What were frocks and fans to one fleeing 
from tragic trouble, the glance seemed to say. 
What the girl needed was exercise, Tom knew; 
change from too much confinement and monotony 
on the yacht. It was getting on her nerves and 
giving the edge that Cousin Phoebe had deplored 
to her temper. Trying to find a way out of some 
difficulty, with time flying and no solution in 
sight, might well wear the strongest nerves thread¬ 
bare. 


152 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


But it was the lucky Mr. Renny who produced 
the bright idea and got all the praise. He came 
tumbling over the bow deck, followed by Frances. 

Back of that wooded island they could see this 
side of Magnolia, he said, was a peach of a little 
cove, a sandy beach under the shelter of the 
wooded bluff. He’d explored in his Skimmer — 
had been ashore too, scouted round in the woods. 
What was the matter with slipping the Gleam in 
back of that island and having a picnic lunch on 
the sand? Good deep water under the lee of the 
island and they could row across to the beach in 
the tender. 

“ Oh, Emmie, do, do! ” begged Frances. “ We 
can put on our bathing suits and take a thermos 
of hot coffee. Wouldn’t you like to go ashore? ” 

Wouldn’t she! The brown eyes shone and 
such a smile as rewarded the able Mr. Renny. 
But she turned immediately to her handy-man. 
“ Do you think we might, Tom? It’s just as you 
say.” 

The soul of Mr. MacLeod expanded. To him, 
keeper in chief of her safety, she appealed. Now 
was his opportunity to discount the efforts of the 
officious Mr. Renny and sorrowfully veto the 
foolish venture shoreward. And later perchance 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 153 

pick out a picnic beach of his own choosing. But 
instead: “ Bully good idea of old Ted’s,” he con¬ 
ceded generously, and took the wheel to negoti¬ 
ate the passage between beach and island while 
the girls flew to the cabin for their swimming 
togs. 

Even Cousin Phoebe went along, deposited in 
the tender by the combined efforts of steward and 
handy-man. Mr. Renny, having no bathing garb, 
concentrated on the picnic, making trips to the 
yacht and spreading a noble repast of cold chicken, 
deviled eggs, olives, jam and sandwiches, with 
piping hot coffee from the thermos bottles. And 
while Frances paddled in the shallows, shrieking 
at the cold of the water, Tom and Emily swam 
and floated and raced each other until they came, 
glowing and stinging all over as with prick of 
fiery needles, to huddle into warm jackets and sun 
themselves on the sand. 

Here was Miss Puzzled, Tom surmised, at her 
natural best; worrisome problems forgotten in gay 
enjoyment of the moment, eyes bright from her 
battle with the icy water and the merry contralto 
laugh parting her red lips. Lovely—in her cling¬ 
ing little swimming suit of blue jersey with the 
scarlet sport coat over her shoulders and pretty 


154 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

bare knees cuddling into the sand as she sat, feet 
curled under her. 

Tom leaned forward and drew up the scarlet 
coat that was slipping. 

“In sooth red flannel is a saucy test 
Which few can put on with impunity,’’ 

quoted he. 

“ Who said that,—Shakespeare? ” 

“ No,—Emerson.” 

“ I don’t believe you.” 

“ Some day I’ll show you-” He caught 

himself up. In this pleasant atmosphere he must 
not assume too much. 

But she was smiling, unoffended at her handy¬ 
man’s presumption. “ When did you learn such 
a lot? Busy, happy young chaps don’t usually 
commune with Emerson, do they? ” 

He was scooping out a well in the sand. “ What 
made you think I was happy? ” 

She looked at him under her lashes. 

“ Aren’t you happy—this morning—Tom? I 
am.” 

Tom rolled over full length in the sand and dug 
diligently at his well. The golden particles ran 
through his slim brown fingers. Suddenly she 
bent over him and whispered: 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 155 

“ I know you are not happy, Tom. That's what 
drew me to you—made me trust you." 

He glanced up at her. “ Unhappiness doesn't 
necessarily make a man trustworthy, Miss Jame¬ 
son. Don’t ever take chances like that. But I'm 
glad you trust me "—he returned to his digging— 
“ and I'm not unhappy now-" 

“ Now-? " 

“ Not while I can serve you!’ 

She slipped her fingers into the sand and began 
to dig also, letting a cascade of golden dust fall 
back into the hole he was making. 

“ Tom," she asked gravely, “ are you married? " 

He sat up straight. “Do you think I would 
be here if I were? ” 

“But if you were unhappy? People do run 
away from that sort of unhappiness-" 

“ It hasn't been that sort of unhappiness. And 
if it were, I shouldn't run away, I guess." (Not 
this particular way anyhow, thought Mr. Mac¬ 
Leod to himself.) But a little thrill ran through 
him. A girl wouldn't ask a man a thing like that 
unless she had begun to feel—well, interested in 
him. . . . 

A few moments of silence while he dug at his 
well and she at hers. Ming came sniffing and 


156 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

trotted off again. Little waves splashed up the? 
beach. “ Where my caravan has rested,” Mr. 
Renny was caroling to the sun-dappled glades of 
the woodland. He had taken Frances on an ex¬ 
ploring expedition and Cousin Phoebe was gather¬ 
ing wild flowers further down the beach. 

“ Tom,” Emily stopped digging and clasped her 
hands around her updrawn knees. “ Don’t you 
think it’s ever excusable to run away from—any¬ 
thing? ” 

“ That would depend,” he answered carefully. 
In her voice had been a note of pleading. She 
was looking far out beyond the curve of the island 
to the blue reaches of ocean. “ Sometimes run¬ 
ning away from things, you know, puts us in a 
worse position than sticking it out and facing 
’em.” 

“ But if it would hurt—oh, more than you could 
bear—to face them? ” 

“ Hurt me? ” he said, “ or just hurt my pride? 
Or my comfort? I’d have to think of that, you 
know. In an offshore gale a ship that drags her 
anchor isn’t always safe . . . she’s likely to 

run up against something a good deal worse than 
the gale.” 

“ But if it was just a little ship, not strong 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 157 


enough to stand the gale.” She turned her glance 
to him, smiling wistfully. 

He smiled back at her. “ Even a little skiff can 
ride out a big gale if its anchor is fast. A ship’s 
strength, you know, doesn’t depend so much on 
the ship—as on her anchor. Mostly we do have 
strength, if we have the right kind of anchor, sunk 
in the right place.” 

“ I suppose you mean by that some strength 
bigger than ourselves-” 

“No,” he replied quickly, “not bigger than 
ourselves . . . but stronger than our impulse 
to dodge or drift.” 

She sat looking out to sea, a frown between her 
brows, her dark eyes full of trouble. Poor little 
ship whose anchor had dragged and who was run¬ 
ning away from the gale. 

“ There’s one thing I have run away from,” 
he admitted. “ I’m running away from it 
now.” 

She turned and looked at him. Young Tom’s 
eyes just then, as he rested on his elbows and 
gazed in his turn out at the far horizon, had that 
look that not everybody saw. Emily saw it. “ I 
know what it is, Tom.” 

He stared at her. “You do?” 


158 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

“I see it back of your eyes. Isn't it—loneli¬ 
ness? ” 

“ But I don't see how you knew? ” 

“ I don't know either. I just knew.'' Through 
the sand her hand slid, palm up, and shoved itself 
under his. “You're not going to be lonely any 
more, now—on the Gleam” 

For one instant his fingers closed and locked 
with hers. Then he sprang up. It was high time 
somebody cleared up the dishes, he insisted, since 
Mr. Benny was patently neglectful of his job. 
And for a few moments there was cheerful clatter 
of crockery being piled in a basket. 

Presently, “ It wasn't a girl, was it? " 

“ What wasn't a girl? " Tom looked up from 
his business of corking a thermos bottle. 

“That made you feel the lonesomeness. No, 
don't answer! " She bundled the table-cloth into 
the basket, her cheeks very red. “ I hadn't any 
right to ask that.” 

Mr. MacLeod knelt on the opposite side of the 
basket and fitted the thermos bottle in accurately. 
Girls, he stated, had meant very little in his life 
until- 

“ Until-” she prompted. 

“ No, I'd better not say it.” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 159 

Across the basket her eyes challenged him, mis¬ 
chievously yet with a gentleness back of the mis¬ 
chief that drew him on. “ Yes, say it, Tom/' she 
whispered. 

He came out with it recklessly: “ Until that 
night in the Pullman.” 

He half expected then that she would draw back 
in one of her swift changes of mood and favor him 
with a haughty stare. Why couldn’t he have left 
well enough alone? Because she had been gra¬ 
cious this morning, extra kind in her little inter¬ 
lude of happy picnicking on sunny sands was no 
reason for her hired handy-man’s presuming to 
suggest an acknowledged friendliness from the 
beginning. The red lips parted; it was coming 
now- 

But what she meant to say he never knew. Mr. 
Renny, not so much leaping as very briskly 
sauntering, bore down upon them. 

“ Beat it,” slid succinctly from the corner of the 
Renny mouth nearest them. “ Beat it quick! ” 


CHAPTER XV; 


From a knoll, higher up the wooded slope, two 
persons were interestedly watching the beach pic¬ 
nic. They appeared to be village folk, the care¬ 
taker of an estate perhaps, and a middle-aged 
chambermaid on her afternoon out. But the 
woman had a pair of opera glasses at her eyes and 1 
both watchers had the air of having been there 
some time. 

Sanctuary of the yacht having been attained 
with careful effect of unhurried departure from a 
finished and done with picnic, Tom was about to 
dispatch Mr. Renny for the red sport coat and 
Cousin Phoebe’s eye-glasses which seemed to have 
been left behind on the beach, when he changed 
his mind, slipped into the crew’s cubby and 
donned his duck jumper and breeches and took 
the tender ashore himself. 

The two observers had come down to the beach 
and were engaged in absorbed examination of the 
red sport coat. “ This what you’re lookin’ for? ” 
The woman held the red coat toward Tom. 

The handy-man thanked her pleasantly. 

“ There was a pair of eye-glasses, too-” 

160 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 161 


“ Here you are.” The man proffered them and 
Tom, touching his saucer cap, moved toward the 
tender. 

“Wait a bit,” invited the masculine person; 
“ kind of a hurry, ain’t you? ” 

“ Can’t keep my people waiting-” 

“ That boat is called the Gleam, I see. What’s 
their name on board? ” 

“ Jameson.” 

“ That fellah in gray short pants the owner? ” 
Since Brother Emerson, this day, was so much 
out of costume and character of masculine invalid¬ 
ism it might be as well to let Mr. Renny carry 
responsibilities. The handy-man admitted that 
Mr. Jameson usually wore knickers when cruising. 

“ Mister Jameson, you say.” The man looked 
at the woman and she raised her eyebrows. 
“ That brown-eyed girl now,” she mentioned, “ the 
one in the blue bathing suit—what there was of it 
—that Mrs. Jameson? ” 

As though waking to the impertinence of this 
catechism the handy-man swung on his heel, got 
into the tender and took up his oars. 

“ Wait a bit, wait a bit,” urged the man follow¬ 
ing along down the beach. “We ain’t merely 
curious, we got a reason for asking-” 


162 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Here the woman reached out and nudged his 
elbow. “ Just tell us this,” she demanded of Tom; 
“ is that fat one with the broken arm named 
Hageboom, or ain't she? ” 

Tom, rowing away, pretended not to hear. He 
very well remembered that Hageboom had been 
the name on Miss Puzzled's suitcase. Something 
was up. Maybe a newspaper advertisement try¬ 
ing to trace the runaways. The moment the 
Gleam reached a harbor of any consequence he 
must get the New York and Boston papers. 

Before taking the coat to Emily he examined 
it carefully. The label inside bore the name of a 
smart Fifth Avenue shop. In one pocket was a 
silk sport handkerchief unmarked with any initial, 
and in the other pocket a vanity kit and half a 
puppy biscuit. 

He decided to say nothing to Emily. She had 
been so happy to-day, he hated to bring that look 
of strain back to the brown eyes. But he wished 
it were bedtime so he could confer with Ted 
Benny who for all his inconsequent frivoling had a 
head on his shoulders. Tom wondered if there 
could be any connection between these country 
folk and the fellow at Marblehead who had been 
concerned with the identity of the yacht. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 163 

But it was to be some time before Mr. MacLeod 
discovered how important a part in his affairs as 
well as the affairs of those with whom destiny had 
entangled his interests that innocent picnic on the 
sands had played. 

They were running past the Reef of Norman’s 
Woe and Mr. Renny, of course, was reciting dra¬ 
matically “ The Wreck of the Hesperus,” im¬ 
mortal stanzas quoted probably every fair day of 
every summer while excursion craft careen gaily 
over the hidden ledge. 

Fog-bells on that rock-bound coast were not 
lacking now,—Tom pointed to the great bell-buoy 
that at the end of the dreadful reef sends out its 
ceaseless warning. And outside the bell-buoy the 
wide and safe and wonderful channel into old 
Gloucester harbor. 

“ Those were the happy days for poets,” sighed 
Mr. Renny. “ They could get away with any¬ 
thing. 

“ Then up and spoke an old sail-or 
Had sailed the Spanish Main, 

‘I prithee put in yonder port, 

For I fear the hurri-cane. ’ 

Imagine trying to put that across now with the 
editor of the Atlantic or the Dial! You wouldn’t 


164 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


even get your postage stamp back, he'd chuck the 
whole thing in his waste-basket so quick." 

Whereupon the playwright was hauled into a 
spirited controversy with two indignant young 
women who dared him to belittle their sacred 
traditions in poesy with his cheap modern stand¬ 
ards of free verse, and the discussion took all three 
down to the aft cabin where bookshelves offered 
opportunity for reference. 

Tom turned to Cousin Phoebe who sat near the 
wheel in the shelter of the windshield. 

“ Miss Phoebe, does the name Hageboom mean 
anything to you? ” 

“Oh, my gracious! ” squeaked the stout lady, 
and jumped in her chair as though a mouse had 
suddenly nipped her ankle. Tom glanced warn- 
ingly at the door of the cabin. 

“ I don't want to alarm Miss Jameson-” 

She leaned forward and regarded him with 
frightened eyes. “ What makes you ask? Has 
anything happened? " 

“ Those people on the beach wanted to know if 
the lady with her arm in a sling was named Hage¬ 
boom—now, please, Miss Phoebe, I shouldn't have 
told you about it except that I thought you could 
keep calm and perhaps help me-" 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 165 

“ Emmie.” Her eyes were terrified. “ Emmie 
mustn’t know. She’s just beginning to quiet down 
and get some sleep. That child has hardly had a 

wink of sleep for two weeks-” 

“ That’s it, we mustn’t upset her unless it is 
absolutely necessary. But I didn’t know how im¬ 
portant this Hageboom business might be.” 

“ You’re a good boy, Tom.” Miss Phoebe looked 
at him kindly. “ I wish Emmie would tell you the 
whole story. But she won’t,—and she has her 
reasons. I’ll tell you this much, however: Hage¬ 
boom is my name. Emmie’s mother and mine 
were first cousins. Now how on earth did those 
people know-” 

Suddenly she clapped a plump hand over her 
mouth. “ Those eye-glasses! ” 

“ The ones I brought back to you? ” 

“ Of course. I told you it was funny you got the 
glasses and not the case. I never lay my glasses 
down without shutting them in the case.” 

“ You think those people kept the case? ” 

“Of course they did—and my name and ad¬ 
dress were on a strip of paper inside the case.” 

“Oh, Miss Phoebe!” Tom felt as upset as 
though this piece of carelessness threatened dis¬ 
aster to plans of his own. 


166 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


“ I know,” she mourned. “ I ought to have 
scratched out the name. But how should I ever 
dream I'd be taking my glasses ashore? Oh, Tom, 
don't tell Emmie! If I've given anybody any 
clue so we can be followed I might just as well get 
off this boat now for I shouldn't dare face 
her-” 

“ I shall not tell her,” assured Tom soothingly. 
“ Buck up, Miss Phoebe, she must not come back 
and find you like this. Listen: it may not amount 
to anything after all. Country people are always 
curious. They read the name inside the case and 
of course assumed the glasses belonged to you and 
not to either of the girls. That name didn't mean 
a thing to them—they were just trying to be 
smart. Cheer up now, here come Renny and 
Miss Jameson.” 

As the two came running up the steps from the 
cabin Tom drew attention to the curious effect 
produced by some fishing boats outside the break¬ 
water. The sails in gray silhouette seemed to be 
pasted against the sky just over the breakwater. 
“ Those boats are actually ten miles out at sea. 
It s an odd effect I've noticed before, coming 
into Gloucester from sou'ward in an afternoon 
light.” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 167 

Miss Phoebe had edged up close to the wheel. 
“Why do you suppose/' she whispered, “they 
kept the case? " 

Tom had wondered about this too but had 
hoped it wouldn't occur to Miss Phoebe. 

They had passed the twin lights of Thatcher, 
and Straitsmouth Light guarding the dangerous 
ledges just above, and Tom said the next big light 
on the waterway to Maine would be on Isles of 
Shoals, twenty miles straight northward. Ten 
miles above that, Boon Island Light. Then an 
hour's run to Cape Porpoise and another hour to 
Cape Elizabeth and after that the stretch to Port¬ 
land. 

“ It sounds a long way," Emily said. “ We'll 
never make it by sundown-" 

“ Not if we go after Ted's typewriter and things 
up Indian River. I thought that was the plan for 
to-day." 

Mr. Renny looked unhappy. “ I thought you 
realized of course that stopping for my duds would 
take an extra day. It's a deserted sort of place, at 
the end of nowhere. Couldn't we put in the night 
there and make an early start for Maine in the 
morning? " 

“ What do you think? " she glanced at Tom. 


168 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


“I don't know how much water there is up 
there/' hesitated the Gleam’s skipper. “ The tide 
is running out now and it wouldn't do to be caught 
in there at dead low if a squall came up. I don't 
like the look of it over nor’west." He glanced at 
some harmless looking rose-tinted clouds above 
the shore line of Newburyport. “ If you say so, 
Miss Jameson, we can chance it. There may be 
good anchorage and as Ted says, it would be a 
quiet place for the night. Otherwise we could go 
straight ahead to Portland and Ted could come 
back by train, pick up his duds and join us 
later-" 

The woebegone face of Mr. Renny at this pro¬ 
posal to separate him from the Gleam made even 
Emily laugh. “ Oh, go ahead and get his play¬ 
things, Tom," she decided. “ The child’ll be ill if 
we deny him that precious typewriter another 
twenty-four hours." 

“You little know, sweet lady, how precious 
some of that stuff is," asserted Mr. Renny 
solemnly; but instantly he became jubilant as the 
Gleam’s prow was pointed westward. Tom knew 
he was specially anxious to recover the extra pair 
of spectacles at his shack. His near-sighted eyes 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 169 

had suffered, these two days, without the glasses 
smashed by his tussle with the surf. 

But all the way up the river Emily sat, elbows 
on the rail and chin propped on clasped hands, 
gloomily contemplating the water and the unin¬ 
teresting bungalows along shore. She refused to 
be amused even by the seals disporting on a sand¬ 
bar at the river mouth, sleek, pretty timid things 
that slid into the water as the yacht approached 
and popped up again the moment it had passed. 
Tom wondered if she was sulky. She had yielded 
graciously enough about the overnight delay but 
perhaps she felt antagonistic toward Mr. Benny 
for balking her plans—that intense longing she 
seemed to have to get to the remote island she had 
set her mind on. 

How quickly, the moment any diversion or ex¬ 
citement was over, her little face fell into its look 
of hopeless depression. No, it wasn’t sulkiness 
but sadness in her eyes as she crouched by the 
rail. The poor little thing was unhappy, miser¬ 
able most of the time and trying to keep up and be 
merry in order not to spoil the fun of the others. 

He had been happy too, this morning. Now his 
spirits were away down again. Watching that girl 
every minute, worrying when she was despondent, 


170 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

feeling buoyant when she was blithe—it was keep¬ 
ing him all upset; taking all the joy out of his 
cruise on the old Vagabond. He’d quit it. He 
had a definite purpose in being on this boat. . . . 

And then suddenly he thought of the splendid 
opportunity he had missed that morning. Instead 
of loafing on the sand he might have been explor¬ 
ing behind the panel! All of them ashore,—he 
could easily have made an excuse to go out to the 
yacht and, the tender along with him, would have 
been perfectly safe from interruption. A heaven¬ 
sent opportunity, and he had neglected it for the 
foolish business of lolling on a beach and looking 
into a pair of brown eyes. Such a chance might 
never come again. Thunderation! What had 
gotten into him? 

No more nonsense from now on! 

Mr. Renny’s shack proved to be a dugout in the 
side of a hill. A low door opening into the grassy 
hillside disclosed a good sized room lined with 
planks and furnished with bunks, chairs and table. 
There were even lamps and a strip of carpet. 

A sort of hunting lodge, Mr. Renny explained, 
owned by some clubmen of Boston who came up 
here for duck shooting in the autumn. Decoys 
were fed for days and then set free, and returning 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 171 

brought their wild brethren with them. “You 
just put down your cigar and stand inside the door 
here and pot ’em. Great, isn’t it? ” enthused Mr. 
Renny. 

“ I call it murder,” retorted Frances. “ Just 
like a pack of men to consider that sport. Pray 
tell me where you got the key? ” 

That, mentioned Mr. Renny, was another story. 
He started suddenly. “ Holy smoke, the door was 
unlocked! Someone’s been here.” 

Groping in a corner he made hurried investiga¬ 
tion. “ By George, someone has been here. Mind 
the paint, Tom, it’s been knocked over.” 

The contents of a can of green paint was oozing 
over the floor. It did not improve Mr. Mac¬ 
Leod’s temper to find he had set his white buck¬ 
skin deck shoe in it. “ Hurry up with your traps,” 
he growled, “ there’s about two feet of water over 
that bar at low tide, and a squall coming. The 
quicker we get out of here, the better. Great 
Scott, Ted, not all those boxes! ” 

“ They’ve been opened,” wailed Mr. Renny 
who was squatting on the floor making hasty in¬ 
spection. “ This one has—with my typewriter. 
And this one—with my books. Golly, that’s 
lucky.” 


172 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


“ We can’t stow those boxes on board/’ objected 
Tom. “ Dump out your things and we’ll pile the 
lot in the tender-” 

“Not on your life,” declared the playwright; 
“ these boxes go along just as they are. I’ll find a 
place for ’em.” 

“ But why boxes instead of a trunk? And why 
the green paint? What’s the idea? ” 

“ Because I couldn’t handle a trunk on the 
Skimmer and I had to move my college duds some 
way. The green paint was up here,—my frat 
color you know-” 

At that instant from the Gleam came a dis¬ 
tracted cry: 

“Tom! Help!” 

Six leaps down the hill and six pulls on the oars 
sent Tom flying to the yacht. He found Emily 
and Cousin Phoebe locked in the cabin. Two men 
in a launch, Emily reported, had come snooping 
alongside. “ I was on the bridge watching you 
people but Cousin Phoebe says they were here 
astern looking at the Gleam’s name. And they 
stood up and tried to peek in the cabin.” 

“ I was changing my stockings,” stated the stout 
lady indignantly. 

“And then I heard them around at the port 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 173 

side and one of them was climbing up, trying to 
get aboard. Of course I screamed for you, Tom, 
and he dropped back in the boat and they went 
away, up that bend in the river.” 

The thing was getting on Tom's nerves. If any¬ 
body was tracking the yacht for one reason or 
another and was going to pounce on them, Tom 
wished to goodness he'd pounce and be done with 
it. This espionage was distinctly irritating. As 
far as he could make out the idea seemed to be, 
not to interfere with them but to keep tabs on 
their movements. And whoever was doing the 
sleuthing wasn't quite certain whether the persons 
on the Gleam were the ones sought. 

Coming out into Ipswich Bay Tom saw that he 
would never be able to make Gloucester before 
the squall struck. Wind was already sweeping 
the water into whitecaps and a pall of blackness 
hung overhead. He decided to run straight across 
the bay to Annisquam and getting out his oil¬ 
skins, called to Mr. Renny to close ports and 
hatches. The three women had remained hidden 
inside the cabin during the down-river trip. Tom 
began to feel as Emily did, that the sooner the 
Gleam started for that sea-begirt isle the better. 
It would take a big boat to trail the yacht to 


174 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Monhegan and these pesky; little launches, once 
given the slip, would be kept pretty busy search¬ 
ing all the Maine harbors where a yacht might 
put in. 

“ Oh, Tom, let me take the wheel.” 

Emily had come up on the bridge. She was 
covered from neck to knee with an oilskin slicker 
and wore a sou’wester dragged down over her 
hair. The wind was screaming past now and 
lightning darted out of the blackness across the 
west. The bay, so sunny and smooth an hour 
ago, was piling up in great green rollers down 
which the Gleam slid, to come up quivering, spray 
flying high at her bow. 

“ Let me take the wheel,” she coaxed. 

He shook his head as she crowded up beside him 
in the shelter of the windshield. Her face, framed 
by the yellow sou’wester, was vivid and excited, 
her dark eyes bright. 

“ Not a bit afraid, are you? ” He smiled at her. 

“ I l°ve a big wind. It’s glorious. 

a We are not in any real danger, are we? ” she 
added as a heavy sea sent the yacht careering to 
port and almost threw them off their feet. Tom 
steadied her with an outfluns arm. “ Danger? 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 175 


Not a bit of it. The old Vagabond laughs at a 
little breeze like this.” 

“ Don't forget her name is the Gleam now,” 
reminded Emily quickly. “ It makes me feel a 
whole lot safer to know you have cruised on her 
before. Where are we going? ” 

He pointed through the blurred windshield. 
The rain had come now and thunder was cracking 
overhead. “You see that red speck ahead? 
Squam Light. Bad sandbar this side of it, but 
beyond the bar a good deep channel into the har¬ 
bor.” 

“ But suppose you didn't know about the sand¬ 
bar and steered straight toward the light? ” 

He laughed, eyes on that red speck ahead. 
“ Then we would be out of luck. Many a boat 
has piled up on that bar, I reckon, because its 
skipper hadn't looked at his charts. A good sailor 
sails by the lights, you know—not at 'em.” 

She was keeping her balance on the unsteady 
deck by clinging to his coat-sleeve. It hampered 
him in his control of the wheel but not for worlds 
would he have told her so. There was something 
oddly pleasant, in that turmoil of storm and dark¬ 
ness, to feel the nearness of the little figure so 
warm and instinct with life. The small hand 


176 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


tugging at his arm was tangible expression of her 
dependence upon him; reminder of his responsi¬ 
bility for her safety and of her trust in it. 

He knew now why in big storms CM had al¬ 
ways wanted Celia beside him at the wheel. Tom 
could see them standing in this very place, Cliff 
frowning through the streaming windshield and 
Celia in her oilskins at his elbow. It gave a man 
a strong and efficient and tender feeling somehow; 
the raging elements all about, his boat under his 
feet and the woman he guarded beside him un¬ 
afraid because she knew he would take care of her. 

He swung the Gleam safely into the channel 
between Squam Light and the leaping line of 
breakers that marked the sand spit. 

“ All safe now. In a minute, when we round the 
point, you’ll see the anchor lights. I always love 
them best of all.” 

And even as he spoke the yacht club windows 
glowed, warm orange squares, through the rain, 
and lanterns glimmered on the boats at their 
moorings. Mr. Renny, sweater collar turned up 
around his ears, came scampering forward as the 
throb of the engine ceased. He had been reassur¬ 
ing Cousin Phoebe, he explained, as he dashed for 
the bow deck. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 177 

“ I know why you love the anchor lights, Tom," 
Emily whispered. “ The big wind was wonder¬ 
ful,—exciting and thrilling—but those anchor 
lights are better. They mean security, don’t 

they? Safe harbor after the storm; peace-" 

“ And home," answered homeless young Tom 
MacLeod. 


CHAPTER XVI 


Brother Emerson possessed one accomplish¬ 
ment which likelier youths might have envied. 

To Tom, tinkering in the engine room, came 
sound of the cheery whistling overhead and his 
own lips pursed to carry the tune. A quaint, gay 
little tune that Mr. Renny had been singing the 
night before to the accompaniment of his glee 
club guitar. 

I passed by your window when the morning was 
red, 

The dew on the rosebud, the lark overhead. 

And oh! I sang softly, though no one could hear, 

To bid you good-morning, good-morning, my dear. 

They had been four days at Annisquam, happy, 
unworried days with nothing more disturbing to 
their peace than the sputter of Fourth of July 
firecrackers on shore and the persevering click of 
Mr. Renny’s typewriter on the bridge. A rough 
sea and a gale out of the north had followed the 
squall, not pleasant conditions for a long pull to 
Maine, so they had delayed over the Sunday and 
the little harbor seeming so remote and so safe 

(and as Mr. Renny cleverly suggested, so easy to 
178 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 179 


dodge out of two ways: up the bay to Ipswich or 
through the canal to Gloucester), they had 
lingered on. 

Tom had hunted up a washerwoman ashore and 
toted suitcases of laundry back and forth, and 
Mr. Renny and he had dashed over to Gloucester 
to execute shopping commissions for the ladies. 
Cousin Phoebe demanded hairnets, Frances, choco¬ 
lates and Emily, newspapers. Tom searched care¬ 
fully through the papers, coming back in the bus, 
but discovered no inquiries for wanted Hagebooms 
or missing yachts. 

He saw Emily later with the newspapers strewn 
about her on the bridge, her eyes, assisted by a 
moving forefinger, hunting down the printed col¬ 
umns. Evidently, like Tom, she found nothing 
alarming, and at luncheon seemed to have cast off 
part of her burden of anxiety or fear and was in 
one of her rare moods of gaiety, joining in the 
nonsense that Frances and the Gleam's steward 
were wont to bandy at meal-times. 

Tom and Mr. Renny continued to take their 
repasts in the galley for though Cousin Phoebe de¬ 
clared it was all foolishness not to sit down to¬ 
gether at table the handy-man insisted on stern 
adherence to yachting conventions while they 


180 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


were in harbor. But Mr. Renny, dashing up and 
down the steps between galley and bridge, never 
failed to make a general lark of meal hour. Be¬ 
tween meals he accompanied Frances ashore for 
rambles over the winding roads of old “ Squam ” 
and they brought home armfuls of the wonderful 
wild roses of Cape Ann. At dusk, Tom rowed 
Emily (carefully appareled as Brother Emerson) 
through the quiet back channels and around 
Lobster Cove where picturesque stone docks and 
ancient, weather-beaten houses cast reflections in 
the still water. 

Last evening they had ventured around the 
point and across the bar to drift in the sunset 
glow. Annisquam, Tom told her, was famous for 
its sunsets and he regretted that she could not 
see the effect at low tide when sea and rocks and 
far stretching sands turned an unforgettable violet 
under the twilight sky. This night, with the tide 
rippling over the bar, the bay had been jade and 
hyacinth and primrose—like an exquisite Kir- 
manshah carpet Emily declared. When colors of 
sea and sky faded, Squam Light across the chan¬ 
nel gleamed like a great ruby against the dusk. 

Perhaps they could stop on the way back and 
get the low tide effect, hoped Tom. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 181 


“ Our way back! ” she repeated, gaze coming 
abruptly from far distances to his face. 

“ From Monhegan,” he reminded her. 

Her startled expression was followed by a little 
troubled frown. “ I’ve never thought of coming 
back,” she whispered. “ I can’t think beyond 
that island, Tom.” She looked away from him at 
the jewel-bright reflection of Squam Light in the 
still sea. “ And if you don’t want to torture me 
don’t speak of it again.” 

This morning, however, she was whistling on 
the bridge. When Tom came up through the 
hatch a little later she had vanished, but he found 
Frances smearing white cleaning-paste on a pair 
of deck shoes. 

“ Oh, Tom—that you? Here’s something Em¬ 
mie asked me to give you.” 

Out of the breast pocket of her middy Frances 
drew an oblong of paper—greenish paper. Tom 
drew back sharply. 

Wages! 

“ Em says you and Mr. Renny can divide it as 
you think best. She doesn’t know what the 
amount ought to be for two helpers aboard but 
she hopes this will be all right-” 


182 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


“ Where is Miss Jameson? ” Tom, regarding 
the outstretched greenish oblong with strong dis¬ 
taste, kept his hands in his pockets. 

“ Why, in the cabin I think, Tom. Emmie just 
didn’t like to hand this to you so I said I would. 
Oh, very well,” Frances laid the unpleasant oblong 
on the chart table and picked up her shoe-sponge, 
“ go and see her yourself. I haven’t anything to 
do with it. But if you take my advice,” she low¬ 
ered her voice and gave him a straight look, 
“ you’ll accept those wages.” 

Thumb and forefinger holding the folded oblong 
as one carries some poisonous thing Mr. MacLeod 
proceeded down the deck to the cockpit and pre¬ 
sented himself at the cabin door. His employer 
looked up from the desk where she seemed to be 
extremely busy checking up items on a grocery list. 

Upon item “ 7 pounds flour, 5 pounds sugar, 2 
cans sardines ” Tom deposited the folded green¬ 
backs. She looked up at him. 

“ I can’t take that, Miss Jameson.” 

His face was red and uncomfortable and in¬ 
stantly her cheeks flushed also. " Of course you’ll 
take it, Tom. It was our agreement, wasn’t it? ” 
But I can’t, Miss Jameson, and Renny won’t 
either. Weve talked it over. You are giving us 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 183 

two a corking vacation on a dandy boat and the 
little we do aboard is no more than any fellows 
would do, cruising, just for the pleasure of being 
along. You folks have been mighty good, taking 
us in as friends, not employees, and accepting 
money would—would spoil the whole thing. Oh, 
Great Scott,” finished Tom, acutely miserable over 
this intrusion of filthy lucre in a friendly relation¬ 
ship, “ you know what I mean! ” 

“You mean”—she was tracing triangles and 
circles on the grocery list—“ it would spoil friend¬ 
ship between you and me? ” 

“ That’s just what I do mean.” Tom’s voice 
was eager. “You have been wonderful to me, 
giving me friendship and—and trust. It's meant 
a lot to me at a—a lonely time. Let’s leave money 
out of it.” He came closer to the writing desk. 
“ I want to help you any way I can. Won’t you 
let me do it just as a friend? . . . And Renny 
too of course,” he appended hastily. 

She looked up and smiled at him. “But I 
thought you were broke, Tom. That’s what you 
told me when you applied for the job. However 
Mr. Renny feels I couldn’t let you waste sev¬ 
eral weeks of your summer just—taking care of 


me. 


184 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Tom grinned. He was not so broke, he assured 
her, that he couldn't afford a little vacation on the 
Gleam. Then, at her doubtful look, he dug into 
his trouser pocket and brought up a handsome roll 
of greenish paper of his own. “ Several hundred 
between me and starvation," he told her. 

“ Tom! " She reproached him, laughter in her 
eyes. “ I don't believe you actually needed this 
job at all." 

The gray eyes laughed back into the brown 
ones. “ But I wanted it." 

“How much money have you?" she asked 
severely. 

" Not much. But as I told you, a good honest 
job waiting for me in September." 

“ What sort of a job? " she inquired quickly. 

“ Oh—work in my line." If she wasn't giving 
anything away neither was he, that's what his 
laughing glance said to hers. As usual any re¬ 
minder of her own problem, any getting beyond 
pleasant forgetfulness of the moment sent the 
smile from her lips and brought that shadow to 
her eyes. She pushed aside the papers on her 
desk and stood up. 

All right, Tom. You and Mr. Renny are 
dears and I appreciate it. I think myself it will 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 185 

be a lot hap—more agreeable to be just friends 
together-■" 

She turned to Frances who was coming through 
the forward cabin carrying the white deck shoes. 
“ They won't take it, Fran. What shall we do, 
fire 'em? " 

Frances put down the shoes and looked mean¬ 
ingly at Emily. “ That might be wiser. You 
know what I think, Em." 

“ It's all settled, Miss Frances," put in Tom 
quickly. He was feeling so much happier with 
the hateful money question consigned to limbo 
that he dreaded to have the argument reopened. 

Frances shook her bobbed head. “ It's better to 
have a business arrangement—for us, Tom, as 
much as for you. You see if anything should 
happen (You know what I mean, Emily!) it 
would be a good deal better all round if Tom and 
Ted Renny are paid employees on this yacht-" 

She looked hard at Emily. “You know very 
well, Em, what you may be letting those boys in 
for, otherwise." 

“ I never thought of that," Emily whispered. 

“ Especially Tom," murmured Frances. Emily 
flushed. 

Tom looked from one to the other. Whatever 


186 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

the dire consequences he wasn't going to sacrifice 
his new-found standing in the ship's company. 
He reached over and extracted from the oblong 
on the desk two crisp one dollar bills. “ One for 
me and one for Renny,” he grinned. “ Full reim¬ 
bursement in advance for services rendered in ca¬ 
pacities of handy-man and steward for the period 
of this cruise. Now, Miss Frances, forget your 
worries, whatever they are. We're paid. Con¬ 
sider the subject closed.” 

He saluted in smart handy-man style and de¬ 
parted through the door to the cockpit. 

But as he was crossing the bridge to the engine 
room hatch he heard Emily’s voice behind him. 
She had run through the cabin to the forward 
door. She was laughing. 

“ Tom, would you mind going to Gloucester to¬ 
day and spending some of those wages of yours for 
a few clothes? I'd love to take a walk to that 
Squam Rock to-night but I don't feel I can do it 
with a sailor in a duck jumper.” 

Thus it was that Mr. MacLeod sauntered down 
to the Gleam’s tender that evening resplendent in 
creased white flannels, his smoothly brushed hair 
guiltless of the defacing saucer cap and inviting 
cool breezes, as befitted the pate of a nice young 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 187 

fellow escorting a summer girl on a stroll. And 
to his joy, it was not Brother Emerson who came 
forth from the cabin, but dainty Miss Puzzled in 
her red sport coat and with an adorable cheeky 
little sport hat drawn down over the bronze-brown 
hair. 

It was a night of nights for Squam Rock. The 
wind, rising at sunset, had strengthened to a 
sturdy gale out of the northwest and they breasted 
it all the way up the hill. When they came out 
on the high bluff facing the sea it tugged at 
Emily’s skirt and ruffled Tom’s hair. A glorious 
gale that whipped the air clean of fog and heat 
haze and made the stars incredibly bright over¬ 
head. The lights on Salisbury Beach, across on 
the Ipswich shore, sparkled like diamonds and far, 
far as eye could see northward, only to be caught 
if one peered breathlessly, a recurring momentary 
luminance against the blackness,—the Isles of 
Shoals flash. 

Scarcely once in a summer, Tom told Emily, 
and only on such a night as this, windy and crystal 
clear, was the great flash of Isles of Shoals visible 
from Squam. 

“You are always showing me a light, Tom.” 


188 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

She spoke so softly that he had to stoop to catch 
her words above the scream of the gale. 

“ It’s the thing most worth finding and 
seeing, isn't it?” he answered. “In the night 
and over the sea. I've the sailor's instinct, I 
reckon.” 

“ Light! ” she whispered. “ It's the thing most 
worth finding always, anywhere. It's what I'm 
looking for,—light. It's what I’ve lost.” She 
drew close to him and slipped her arm through his, 
her cheek all but touching his coat-sleeve. “ Oh, 
Tom, help me to find it,—light! ” 

But before he could answer she drew away from 
him and made some reference to the discomfort of 
the wind in this exposed spot. “ Let’s run before 
it,” she challenged. “ I'll beat you to the edge of 
the hill.” And not again that evening did her 
talk approach the serious. 

Coming down the hill they had the gale behind 
them and Tom's arm was slipped beneath hers, 
first to steady her on the steep incline and then 
for no particular reason except that he kept it 
there and she let it remain. The air was cool and 
bracing, like September, and they walked fast. 
The moon had come up and made sharp shadows 
of tossing branches on the roadway. The bracing 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 189 


air and their brisk motion sent the young blood 
bounding through their veins. 

Here again was the real Emily, Tom thought 
happily, the incarnation of light-hearted girlhood, 
full of chatter about inconsequent things and 
laughing when she tripped on a loose stone and he 
caught her up. The arm under hers was indis¬ 
pensable of course both admitted though neither 
mentioned it aloud. 

Whether it was his decent flannels that made 
him feel his own man again, or because the 
abominable wage-basis had been discontinued, he 
rejoiced to-night in a new footing of friendliness 
between them, a sort of taken-for-granted com¬ 
radeship. 

They rowed out to the Gleam over wind-tossed 
water, Emily breaking into little shrieks of 
mock terror when choppy waves splashed her 
coat. As they came up from the tender they 
could hear Mr. Renny singing to his glee club 
guitar. 

“And oh! I sang softly, though no one was near, 

Good-night and God bless you, God bless you, my 
dear,” 

sang Mr. Renny on the bridge. He was singing to 
Frances but down by the steps Tom’s hand held 


190 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


Emily's for a long minute. Then she slipped aft 
and vanished in the cabin. 

Whatever the dire consequences (as Frances 
had darkly hinted to-day) if the Jameson Nemesis 
overtook Mr. MacLeod in the capacity of familiar 
friend rather than humble wage earner aboard 
the Gleam , Mr. MacLeod, undressing in the crew's 
cubby by light of the moon, decided they were not 
worth speculating about. 


CHAPTER XVII 


Tom found himself thinking, next morning, of 
what Emily had said about light. He had no idea 
that she meant light in the religious sense; it was 
light on her problem she craved, some gleam to 
point the way as she had said when she changed 
the yacht’s name. 

Tom was not what he would have called relig¬ 
ious. If you had pressed him to define his creed 
he would probably have told you, rather shyly, 
that it was: to keep decent, to do the square thing, 
and to lend a hand. And in one’s work to labor 
for the idea back of the work rather than for 
possible perquisites derived from the labor. Light, 
as she meant it, he imagined meant good judg¬ 
ment, wisdom to choose the best way out of a 
difficulty. 

Choosing implied two ways to be taken, and 
choice, in a girl like Emily, suggested, as Ted 
Renny had instantly said, a man somewhere. It 
might be a question of marrying somebody she 
disliked for benefit to someone near and dear—a 

personal sacrifice she found it hard to make. Or 
191 


192 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

it might be that she loved a man to whom another 
woman had more right and now, having taken her¬ 
self out of the way, was unhappy and trying to 
decide whether the sacrifice was worth while. 
Tom much preferred the former solution. What¬ 
ever her worry, she was dreading pursuit and 
knew she had but a short time to come to a 
decision. 

Rowing back from shore with the breakfast 
cream he was recalling Squam Rock in the wind 
and darkness and her hand tucked through his 
arm as they gazed across the sea to the distant 
flash on Isles of Shoals. Last night’s gale had 
blown itself out, leaving a clean freshness in the 
air and the water was blue, reflecting a cloudless 
sky. A fine day for a walk—up through those 
woods on the other side of Lobster Cove maybe— 
if she would go. 

Sound of cheery voices on the bridge floated 
down as he tied his tender at the steps. 

“And oh! I sang softly, though no one could hear, 

To bid you good-morning, good-morning, my dear,” 

caroled Mr. Renny, depositing a plate of smoking 
waffles in front of Cousin Phoebe. 

Emily leaned over the rail. “ Where’s Ming, 
Tom?” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 193 

“ Great Scott! ” gasped the handy-man. Lost 
in dreamy reflections of Squam Rock and starlight 
he had rowed away from shore unmindful of 
Growlo’s absence from the tender. He leaped 
down the steps and began to unloose the painter. 

A clear and charming voice came across the 
water. “ Here is your dog. I'm bringing him.” 

Approaching the Gleam was a small launch. A 
yacht's boy had the wheel and in the stern a girl in 
a white frock sat cuddling the Peke. The girl 
smiled up into Emily’s anxious face as the launch 
drew in at the Gleam’s landing steps. 

“ The darling was whimpering and running 
back and forth along the edge of the dock. I 
thought he was going to jump and try to swim 
out to you. I saw your man had forgotten him 
so I brought him along.” She nodded toward a 
handsome yacht that had come into the harbor 
the night before. “ I’m on the Loaf along.” 

Emily ran down to the deck and stood at the 
top of the landing steps, arms outstretched for 
Ming who was growling atrociously and trying to 
scramble out of his new friend’s embrace. The 
two girls chatted a moment and then the stranger 
lifted the dog toward the Gleam’s handy-man who 
was supposed to be, during this conversational ex- 


194 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


change between his betters, standing respectfully 
at attention. 

Contrary to all requirements and canons of 
yacht etiquette, however, this handy-man had 
presented his back to his betters and was seem¬ 
ingly lost in contemplation of the Gleam’s coat 
of paint. 

“ Tom! ” Emily’s voice was a bit sharp. “ Turn 
around and take Ming from the young lady.” 

And then for the first time the young lady 
looked into the face of the Gleam’s handy-man. 
It was a good long look. Her eyes opened; then 
her mouth. She sprang to her feet. 

“Why TomMacL-” 

“ Steady, miss,” warned the handy-man, stoop¬ 
ing quickly to balance her launch. As he came 
upright he breathed softly, “ Please! ” 

Handing up the squirming Growlo she smiled 
kindly at the Gleam’s employee. “ I didn’t know 
you at first, Tom. How are you? You seem to 

have a nice position. A fine yacht-” Her 

glance flicked over him, over the length of the 
Gleam. She was a tall girl with a drawling voice 
and dark-lashed blue eyes. The blue eyes had a 
mocking expression as they rested on Tom in his 
sailorman’s jumper. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 195 

“ Thank you, miss,” muttered the handy-man, 
who looked anything but happy and pleased to 
receive these assurances of good will. He looked, 
as Frances informed Mr. Henny afterward, mad 
enough to bite nails. 

Fifteen minutes after the launch had departed 
it was back, this time sliding along the port side 
to the bow where the handy-man was moodily 
smoking his pipe and waiting for his betters to 
finish their breakfast. The Loafalong’s boy 
handed up an envelope. “ She says to give it to 
you. A tip for somethin’, I guess.” 

Tom, the envelope in hand, slipped down the 
hatch to the crew’s cubby. He had noted a pair 
of brown eyes interestedly watching from the 
bridge. 

On a sheet of smart note paper embossed with 
the Loafalong's burgee was scrawled: 

Simply have to know all about it, Tommy. 

Yon come right over and tell me or I give 
the whole show away. D. 

And he knew she was capable of just that. He 
knew Doris Twombly. Three years since he’d seen 
her—that summer before he started for India. 
They had played around together at Bar Harbor 
while the Vagabond lay at anchor beside the 


/ 

196 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 
Twombly yacht. Maybe if he hadn’t been start¬ 
ing for India in September—but that was non¬ 
sense, she’d only been amusing herself with lonely 
young Tom MacLeod. Celia and Cliff had so 
many things to occupy them ashore. Not a thing 
that girl was afraid of—and she had a devilish 
streak of mischief in her, too. He’d better go 
over. He could slip aboard the Loajalong on his 
way back from market. And he’d make his call in 
his handy-man outfit, serve her ladyship right if 
she purposed to receive him aft and quiz him. She 
might have seen he didn’t want to be recognized 
and have had tact enough not to butt in. A man 
would have had more sense. 

Miss Twombly’s blue eyes, mocking between 
fringes of lashes, looked him over—duck breeches, 
jumper and saucer cap in hand—as he was ushered 
down the Loaf along’s deck by a Jap steward. She 
was extremely smart in her frock of white shan¬ 
tung, with hoops of jet swinging at her ears and 
she lounged in a low chair on the Loafalong’s 
after deck where rugs and potted plants and little 
tables set about gave the effect of a luxurious out¬ 
door living-room. 

She seemed honestly glad to see Tom MacLeod 
but was naturally consumed with curiosity over 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 197 

the circumstances in which she had discovered 
him. She had heard about Cliff and Celia and 
had wondered about Tom. Of course he would 
be cruising now on the Vagabond —but why under 
these peculiar conditions? And why was his old 
Vagabond now posing as the Gleam f Her father 
wasn’t aboard the Loajalong —luckily for the Mac¬ 
Leod she inferred. And of course mamma didn’t 
know one yacht from another. They expected a 
lot of guests to join them at York Harbor. But 
what was it all about? Tom had simply got to 
tell her. Laughing eyes assured Mr. MacLeod of 
her suspicion that he was up to some preposterous 
if not reprehensible mischief. 

Tom thought the best way to enlist her sympathy 
and ensure her cooperative silence was to take 
her, partly at least, into his confidence. He 
told her about the sale of the Vagabond and his 
disappointment about a summer cruise, and 
how he had seen the newspaper advertisement 
for a handy-man and decided to apply for the 
job. 

“ I got it,” finished Tom, “ and here I am.” 

The mocking blue eyes contemplated him 
speculatively. “ Some lark, my word! I can’t 
seem to make it fit my conception of you though, 


198 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Tommy. A lot of fellows might have done it— 
for a lark. But larkishness to that extent doesn’t 
seem just in your line. Unless three years in 
India have changed you a lot.” 

Mr. MacLeod having nothing to say to this she 
continued, still with her mocking smile: 

“ Which is it, Tommy, golden locks or the one 
with the deep, deep brown eyes? ” 

“ Neither one,” the Gleam's handy-man looked 
dignified, “ takes any extraordinary personal in¬ 
terest in me.” 

“ Jameson, you say their name is—um. Of 
course you know who she is, Tom? ” 

“ Who is? ” 

“ Why, Brown Eyes.” 

“ Do you? ” 

“ I do. But if you don’t ”—she leaned forward 
and smiled—“ I wonder if some true friend of 
yours oughtn’t to tell you? ” 

“ Miss Jameson didn’t appear to know you,” 
retorted Mr. MacLeod. 

“ No, but I know her all right. A good many 
people, Tom dear, know her.” Under the quiz¬ 
zically arched brows the blue eyes regarded him 
with what seemed to be profound compassion. 
She was enjoying herself hugely, Tom could see 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 199 

that. “ No, Tom, I don’t think I shall tell 
you-” 

“ I haven’t asked-” 

“ If she hasn’t told you all about it I’m not 
going to. You’re quite a big boy now, you know, 
Tommy, and old enough to look after yourself.” 
Suddenly she doubled up in her chair. “ It’s the 
funniest thing I’ve run across in years. It’s 
priceless. But I’m not telling a thing—oh no! 
Far be it from me to give a sister woman away. 

I’ll tell you this much, though-” 

“ Better not tell me anything,” said Tom stiffly. 
He rose. How had he ever found this girl attrac¬ 
tive? 

“ Glad you find something so amusing in the 
situation,” he remarked. “ I scarcely think the 
affairs of my employer would have any personal 
interest for me. Or that Miss Jameson would care 

to have me advised of them-” 

“Advised—advised,” she shook with laughter 
again. “ Oh, Tom MacLeod, you’ll be the death 
of me. Are you going? Well, good luck to you. 
But since you mention the word advice, take a 
little from—from one who wishes you well, 
Tommy. Watch your step, old dear. You’re in 


200 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


a ticklish position even if you don’t want to know 
about it. My word! ” 

He stopped short on his way across the deck. 
“ Look here, Doris, is there any reason you know 
of why my presence on that yacht is harmful to— 
to anybody on it? ” 

“ Not if ”—she looked straight at him, her eyes 
serious now—“you remain simply the yacht’s 
handy-man.” She walked beside him toward the 
steps. “ You are quite right, I have no business 
to tell you that girl’s affairs—if she hasn’t told 
you. I doubt not you’ll find out before the end 
of this precious cruise. She doesn’t know me be¬ 
cause she never met me. I happened to be visit¬ 
ing this spring in—in her town, and I saw your 
‘ Miss Jameson ’ at the country club.” 

Tom was in the tender now and had picked up 
his oars. The lazy blue eyes slanted down at him 
over the Loafalong’s rail. 

“You might ask her,” the drawling voice fol¬ 
lowed him as he rowed away, “ if she ever heard 
of anybody named Geggie.” 


CHAPTER XVIII 


Geggie. Now where had he heard that name, 
Geggie? 

Tom cogitated over it all afternoon. He had 
known about some Geggie, but when? And in 
what connection? Something disagreeable it 
seemed to be. In his past there had been a 
Geggie and the very sound of the name aroused 
remembered dislike. 

He went over names of his college mates. Of 
prep school chums. Names of men at the train¬ 
ing camp and in France. Names of people known 
by Cliff and Celia. . . . Ah, now he was get¬ 
ting warm! Geggie pocketed itself with some¬ 
thing relating to Celia. Try as he would, how¬ 
ever, he could not pin the memory down. 

If Tom had belonged to the petticoat gender he 
would probably have mentioned “ Geggie ” in the 
presence of the Jameson trio and then watched 
facial expressions. But if there was nothing 
oblique (as has been related) in young Tom’s 
glance, neither was there anything oblique in his 
201 


202 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

methods. If “ Geggie ” meant anything to Emily 
Jameson some day she would tell him about it. 
Sooner or later she was going to tell him all about 
everything, just as he was going to tell her all 
about himself. 

Arriving at this, he sat back suddenly on his 
heels (he was splicing a rope up on the bow deck) 
and gazed off at the shore-line of Squam. What 
reason had he to assume that Emily Jameson and 
he were going to tell each other everything? 
Nevertheless, far down under the stern decision 
with which he dismissed this impossible presump¬ 
tion lurked the perfectly certain conviction that 
they would . 

Anyhow, he wasn’t going to puzzle any more 
about Geggies. And as for leaving the Gleam 
because of any ridiculous warning of Miss Doris 
Twombly’s, it was too absurd. That girl was a 
mischief-maker. He recalled the Doris Twombly 
of three years ago; her impish love of teasing and 
her propensity to stretch the truth a bit if so be 
she could torment her victim of the moment. If, 
as she so kindly advised him, remaining on the 
Gleam was likely to hurt himself—well, he would 
take the risk of that. If it was likely to hurt 
Emily or Frances or Cousin Phoebe the probability 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 203 

was they would know it, and he wouldn’t be 
here. 

He’d given his word to help Emily Jameson and 
so long as his presence on the Gleam was helping 
her, on the Gleam he proposed to stay. That was 
that! 

He decided not to impart any of the information 
that had been pressed upon him to Ted Renny. 
He wasn’t quite certain how Mr. Renny would be 
affected by these hints and innuendos of the lady 
of the Loajalong . He intended to stick to the 
Gleam himself and wasn’t going to be bothered 
with arguments for or against. 

Nobody had betrayed special interest in his visit 
to the Loajalong. At luncheon Ted Renny had 
tried to rag him about it and Frances had offered 
some teasing comment to which he had made 
mumbling reply: Girl he used to know years ago. 
Friend of his mother’s. Curious of course to find 
out why he was employed on a yacht. After that 
the subject, to his relief, was dropped. 

It was a dull afternoon though. The play¬ 
wright’s typewriter clicked away steadily on the 
bridge. The two girls (Tom discovered by recon- 
noitering with the tender) were loafing with mag¬ 
azines under the cockpit awning. Cousin Phoebe 


204 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


was probably dozing in the cabin. The Gleam 
lolled sleepily on a still blue sea. Tom would 
have gone ashore but was afraid he might run into 
that woman again. 

The unshaded bow deck was blistering hot, so 
Mr. MacLeod sought his cot in the crew’s cubby 
and went to sleep. 

He was roused by the brisk voice of Mr. Renny 
who stuck his head through the low doorway from 
the engine room. 

“ Pipe how our trusty lookout standeth the first 
dog watch! Heave-ho, matey, skin aloft while 
I’m liftin’ the hook. Ours for the bounding main.” 

Tom sat up yawning. “ What time is it? ” 

“ Just went four bells. Do you get me? Order 
is: up anchor and away. We’re tired of this here 
anchorage. Fact is,” explained Mr. Renny, “ too 
many yachts around. It distracts the crew. So 
we’re off-” 

“ Off where?” Tom brought his feet to the 
floor. 

" To Maine, bless you. Why linger here when 
Maine s our destination? At least that seems to 
be the idea.” 

" But great Jupiter!—we can’t start to-night. 
Why didn’t you call me earlier? ” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 205 


“ How'd I know you were aboard? Right at the 
climax of my third act; genius spattering all over 
the place. But I hear you were spied sneakin' off 
in the tender and it was assumed you were taking 
tea on the Loajalong -” 

“ Oh, get out of here," entreated Mr. MacLeod. 
“ I've no doubt you insinuated that bright idea 
yourself." 

“ Why not? " grinned Mr. Renny and slammed 
the sliding door to cover his retreat. 

But when the handy-man presented himself aft 
for orders it transpired that the urgent reason for 
departure had naught to do with his unimportant 
movements in the way of renewing ancient friend¬ 
ships. Mr. Renny, the Gleam's owner informed 
him, had observed a suspicious looking launch 
hanging about, and one of the men in the launch 
had a red beard. It had been a red-bearded man, 
Emily reminded him, who had frightened her so, 
trying to climb aboard the Gleam up Indian 
River. Didn't Tom think they might start at 
once? 

“ But that seventy-mile run to Maine, Miss 
Jameson! In the dark—not even a moon till to¬ 
ward morning. I don't like to do it, honestly I 
don't." 


206 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 
Mr. Renny thought they ought to start at once, 
he was informed. (Since when had Mr. Renny 
constituted himself courier of the party?) Tom 
produced several perfectly reasonable objections 
to this wild idea of a night trip northward but all 
the time Emily’s foot tapped the deck and her 
little chin had an obstinate tilt. 

Finally, “ Perhaps, Tom, you have made an 
engagement for this evening? Of course I dislike 

to interfere with your plans-” 

If this was intended to annoy her handy-man it 
failed signally. Tom was only distressed. 

“ My plans are your plans,” he looked at her 
straightly. “ I don’t approve of taking that trip 
at night, but if you want to go—wherever you 
want to go,” he added recklessly, “ all right, we 
go.” 

Whereupon she was suddenly all smiles and 
most sweetly reasonable. She didn’t want to urge 
Tom against his better judgment. Of course he 
was captain of the yacht and she would abide by 
his decision. But—and oh, how wheedling brown 
eyes could be!—she did so want to start at once. 
And wouldn’t it be fun to pick up the lights all 
along the way? He could show her each one 
. . . why of course she intended to remain on 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 207 


the bridge all night. She’d had a wonderful sleep 
this afternoon. 

Thus it was that a very contented party slipped 
out of Squam harbor just after the boom of the 
sunset gun. All but Cousin Phoebe who expressed 
dark doubts of their ever seeing Portland and 
announced her intention of sitting up all night 
with one of the life preservers buckled round her. 
The suspicious launch had taken a party of 
womenfolk aboard and set forth up Ipswich way 
for a sunset jaunt (after the Gleam’s riding 
lantern had been hoisted, Tom noted that,) so the 
yacht’s nose was turned southward into the river 
passage to Gloucester. 

“ High water to-night or it couldn’t be done,” 
their skipper assured them, but nobody bothered 
about that. Tom was supposed to look after such 
details. The river was beautiful, serene and still, 
reflecting the turquoise and rose of the sky. And 
picturesque vistas opened up ahead as the Gleam 
picked her way through the tortuous channel and 
between the great clumsy buoys. Mr. Renny 
fetched his guitar from the crew’s cubby and tried 
to make his lyric tenor sound robusto in a rollick¬ 
ing sea ditty: 


208 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


“I chanced to meet a sailorman that once I used to 
know; 

His eye it had a rovin’ gleam, his step was light and 

gay, 

He looked like one just in from sea to blow a nine- 
months’ pay. 

And as he passed athwart my hawse he hailed me 
long and loud: 

‘Oh, find me now a full saloon where I may stand 
the crowd.’ 

“ Now, all together/’ urged Mr. Renny, fingers 
hovering over a mighty chord: “ Bringin’ home 
the Rio Grande -” 

None so joyous as Mr. Renny it seemed to be 
faring once again toward the bounding sea away 
from confining harbors. His exuberant spirits in¬ 
spired them all. Even Emily seemed irresponsi¬ 
ble and care-free. They had to wait for a draw¬ 
bridge to be opened and it was dusk when they 
slipped under the second bridge through swirling 
water of meeting tides and came out into the 
breeze-swept expanse of Gloucester harbor. 

“ Oh, beautiful! ” breathed Emily, her mood of 
laughter stilling as she drew nearer to Tom at the 
wheel. The strong ocean breeze whipped an 
amethyst sea. Twilight softened the shore-line 
with its quaint peaked roofed buildings and an¬ 
cient dories drawn up on a shelving beach. Masts 
of old fishing schooners towered in black silhouette 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 209 


against the evening sky. Eastern Point Light 
glowed clear and crimson and beyond it sparkled 
the red gleam of the breakwater light. From an 
anchored warship a radiant ray whipped the pur¬ 
ple dusk, sweeping sky and water and shore. The 
strong salt breeze and the invigorating fishy tang 
in the air. . . . Gloucester, unforgettable in 

any light, most unforgettable viewed thus at even¬ 
tide from the sea. 

“ The summer people come and go, and play 
a while and paint a while,” mused Tom, “ and 
their foolish little boats frisk about the harbor, 
but always Gloucester remains—the Gloucester of 
fishing folk for generations. Look at those old 
fellows anchored over there,—whalers. The Seal 
and the Walrus. I’ve been aboard both. Think 
of the storms those old ships have weathered and 
the men who have sailed in them—sturdy and 
steadfast as the granite of this Cape itself. My 
mother’s people,” he added shyly, “were New 
England folks. I suppose that’s why it means 
such a lot to me.” 

Emily stood beside him, the ocean wind blowing 
her hair. The ray of whipping light from the war¬ 
ship flicked over the Gleam and touched the girl’s 
face, lifted to Tom’s. 


210 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


“ And some of that granite is part of you,” she 
answered. “ It's what one feels about you; your 
steadfastness. It makes people who know they 
are like those foolish little summer sailboats— 
playing about, feel ashamed. I—I wish I had 
some of that New England granite in me.” 

The Gleam passed through the white ray of 
the searchlight and was gone, out in the darkening 
reaches of ocean. Her ruby and emerald running 
lights glowed jewel-like against the night, and her 
tumbling wake stretched back, a creamy trail 
across black water. 

In that moment when, picked out by the search¬ 
light’s moving ray, she had passed, milk-white 
across the dark, the engine of a launch swinging 
round the breakwater from the northward ceased 
its clamor. The launch drifted on the swells and 
a red-bearded man at the wheel called to another 
man lounging beside a girl aft. 

“ Get that, Bill? ” 

“ Sure did. Convinced now? ” 

“ Golly,” the man at the wheel chuckled, “ if 
heatin' it out at night after hoistin' his anchor 
lantern to fool us didn’t convince me I dunno what 
would! Hittin' it up for Portland, you reckon? ” 
“Yeah, Portland or Newburyport or Kenne- 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 211 

bunkport or any one of a dozen ports. I told you 
we ought to stick around.” 

“ Shucks! ” retorted the red-bearded man. 
“ He's got 'em aboard all safe. And we can do 
fourteen to his twelve. I ain't worryin'. I'll tele¬ 
phone down the line and find out where he puts in. 
With that tonnage and the tide droppin' he's on a 
long jaunt for a deep water harbor.” 


CHAPTER XIX 

They had left the splendid alternating flash of 
Isles of Shoals behind. The white blaze on Boon 
Island too, and the ruby eye of Cape Neddick 
gleamed far astern to port. It was past midnight 
and the moon had come up over the ocean’s rim, 
an old, old moon that gave but faint radiance; 
but to Tom’s infinite relief there was now, instead 
of menacing blackness ahead, a dim grayness 0 
Dark bulks of reefs or white lines of breaking surf 
would at least be discernible. 

As yet, however, the course was safe and clear, 
a straight run northward for a couple of hours 
until they should reach the lightship off Cape 
Elizabeth. They ought to pass the lightship, he 
thought, about half-past two. Then would come 
the ticklish business. He was running slowly hop¬ 
ing that kindly dawn would overtake him before 
he had to negotiate that worrisome passage into 
Portland harbor. 

In truth Tom was deeply anxious. Not only 
the old Vagabond but a very precious freight of 
human souls was entrusted to his hands this night 
and the easy assumption of his charges that every¬ 
thing was safe because he was at the helm made 
212 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 213 

the greater his own sense of terrific responsibility. 
Colossal nerve for him (Tom MacLeod reflected) 
to be taking this boat by night over a course he 
had never essayed by day, a difficult course even 
in sunlight and to one familiar with every inch of 
the way. It looked to young Tom about the 
biggest job he had ever tackled, but somehow he 
had got to put it through and not let the others 
know how increasingly nervous he felt with every 
mile the yacht gained northward. 

“ Hot coffee and ham sandwiches,” announced 
Emily at the top of the galley steps. “ I made 
Ted Renny fix up something after dinner. Where 
are we? ” 

“ Somewhere off Ogonquit.” Tom pointed to 
the distant shore-line, a shadowy streak between 
the grayness of sky and ocean. “We ought to 
pick up Cape Porpoise in a few minutes.” 

She had changed into the white frock and red 
sport coat that Tom liked so much better than 
Brother Emerson’s outfit, and had tied around 
her head and low over her forehead a deep blue 
ribbon to keep her hair from flying in the crisp 
breeze. 

Cousin Phoebe was asleep, she reported, with 
the life preserver on the foot of her bunk and 


214 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Ming locked in his traveling basket, and Ted 
Renny and Frances were lounging on the lazyback 
in the cockpit. Mr. Renny seemed more anxious 
about followers in their wake than about perils 
ahead. 

“ Let him do the worrying.” She drew a deep 
breath, facing the tumbled expanse of ocean to 
eastward. “ Isn't it glorious, Tom? I'm going to 
be happy to-night and I'm not going to spoil one 
minute of it worrying about what’s behind or 
ahead.” 

She poured out the coffee and handed him cup 
and sandwiches as he ate his lunch with one hand 
on the wheel. They made a merry meal of it. 
Then he suggested that she take the wheel while 
he dashed to the crew's cubby for his tobacco 
pouch. 

“ But what am I to steer by? ” she demanded 
helplessly. “ I can't see a thing ahead but water. 
How on earth do you set your course? ” 

Tom laughed. “ Well, for one thing there's the 
moon to eastward. Keep her just where she is, so 
you see her without turning your head. And 
there's Boon Island Light down astern. You want 
to see it over your right shoulder. If you get it 
over your left shoulder you're off the course.” 


“ LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 215 

When he came back in less than five minutes 
she was tremendously proud of herself and thrilled 
by her sensation of responsibility: guiding the 
yacht all by herself into the dark. He let her 
keep the wheel, lounging beside her with his pipe. 
They had lost Boon Island now but Cape Porpoise 
Light twinkled ahead. 

“ Suppose anything happened to it and it went 
out. And there wasn’t any moon.” 

“ There’d still be the stars,” Tom reminded her. 
“ You’d be surprised how many old salts steer by 
the stars—without even knowing the names of 
’em.” He told her about an old Gloucester fisher¬ 
man who always found his way home when be¬ 
yond glimpse of shore lights by “ ‘ Keepin’ the dog 
star just to stabboard o’ the masthead.’ He in¬ 
sisted it was the dog star because it shone during 
dog-days. When I told him the dog star was 
Sirius and didn’t appear till Thanksgiving time 
he sniffed at such ‘ book-larnin’ tommyrot.’ The 
dog star was the dog-day star, common sense and 
any sailor would tell you that. And I’ve found a 
lot of old seagoing fellows with the same notion.” 

“ What star is it? ” 

“ Arcturus.” He showed her how to find it by 
continuing an imaginary line from the curve of the 


216 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Dipper’s handle. All they would have to do, he 
pointed out, would be to keep a course parallel 
with that imaginary line between bright Arcturus 
and the Great Bear’s tail and they would be mov¬ 
ing safely northeast by north on the long run 
between Thatcher’s Lights and the Portland 
Lightship. 

“ Starlight,” breathed Emily. “ More lights that 
you show me, Tom. I’ve never thought about 
lights before or how much they mean.” 

The moon was higher now; it picked out lines 
of silver on the swelling seas that rolled and rolled 
at them from the ocean to eastward and made the 
spray that dashed across the Gleam’s bow a spar¬ 
kling veil pricked with tiny jewels of phosphores¬ 
cence. The moon’s radiance showed Emily’s face, 
eager and intent behind the wheel. Tom had 
never seen her look so happy as she did to-night. 
Beneath the ribbon bound low across her brows 
her eyes were shining. And her red lips were 
parted, not pressed hard together as they so often 
were when the little brooding line of trouble came 
between her eyes. 

“ Suppose there was a fog,” she suggested, “ and 
we couldn’t see your old sailor’s dog star or Cape 
Porpoise over there—what then? ” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 217 

“You forget this.” Tom nodded toward the 
binnacle glowing steadily in front of the wheel. 

“ By and by when we get past Cape Elizabeth 
you’ll see how our binnacle and the compass are 
going to find the way for us.” (He devoutly 
hoped they would! The nearer he got to the 
dreaded undertaking the more nervous he was 
feeling about it, inside.) 

“ The ‘ binnacle light/ ” murmured Emily. “ It’s 
still another, isn’t it? ” 

“ Another? ” 

“ Another light.” 

“And probably the most valuable thing on 
board to-night,” remarked Tom. He was thank¬ 
ful indeed that Cliff’s beloved binnacle had been 
included in the bill of sale when the Vagabond 
changed hands. 

She turned a startled glance on him. “ There 
isn’t any real danger, is there—going this way, by 
night? ” 

“ I’d have preferred to do it by day.” 

She was silent a long moment. 

“ I’m sorry, Tom. I shouldn’t have asked you 
to do it. It wasn’t that launch; it was—a silly 
reason.” She bent low over the wheel. “ To see 
if you would go—if I could make you leave Squam 


218 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 
harbor just because I asked you to at a minuted 
notice. 

“ Oh, I’m ashamed,” she added, not allowing 
him to reply. “ It was trivial pf me. I’ve done 
trivial things all my life—just to get my own way. 
I've met everything trivially, and now—and now 
that I’ve come up against a big thing I’ve been 
trivial too. I couldn’t meet it, and so I ran away 
from it. You’ve taught me things, Tom, you and 
your lights-” 

He was distressed. So little it took,—the least 
association of thought or swift flicker of some ever 
dogging shadow of memory—to dislodge her spirit 
from a brief pinnacle of joy. He too had felt 
happy to-night in their shared adventure, their 
aloneness on these wide seas. In her comradeship 
and in her laughter. He smoked his pipe, staring 
into the dark ahead. He didn’t know how to an¬ 
swer her without saying more than he ought. It 
would be so easy to say something that might 
spoil their pleasant comradeship aboard the 
Gleam . 

Of course it was a man she had run away from. 
Tom hated him. Some man who was trying to 
get her against her will. She had given some 
promise she hadn’t courage to keep and was run- 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 219 


ning away to think it over—to find some way out. 
How could a poor young engineer without a penny 
to his name except two measly railroad bonds 
hope to be the way out? Tom sternly kicked this 
ridiculous thought to the back of his mind. He 
could serve her, help her it might be to find the 
light she sought, but girls of Emily Jameson's 
class were not for the Tom MacLeods—since the 
MacLeod fortune had been wiped away. 

Wood Island Light was visible now above the 
port bow. He told her they would very soon pick 
up the Lightship and the wonderful double light 
on Cape Elizabeth. But she cast the merest 
glance at the ruby flash of Wood Island. 

“ Why did you let me make you, Tom?—take 
this night trip, I mean.” 

He was lighting his pipe, cupping the match in 
his hands over the pipe bowl. “ I'm only your 
skipper,” he reminded her. “ It's you who set our 
destination.” 

For some reason she was merry again. “ I'll 
have to be careful. Would you do anything I 
asked you to, Tom? ” 

He smiled at her as he flung his match over¬ 
board. “ I reckon I would. Anything within 


reason. 


220 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

She swung the wheel petulantly. “ Oh, now 
you spoil it all. You’d always keep a reserve of 
reason, wouldn’t you, Tom? That’s you.” 

“ I have to take care of you. That’s my job, 
isn’t it, on this cruise? Suppose you told me to 
steer on the rocks, I’d have to refuse, wouldn’t I— 
to take care of you? ” 

She sighed. “ I might tell you to steer on the 
rocks,—better not trust me, Tom. But I’d know 
you wouldn’t. That’s the big thing about you: 
you make a person feel safe, somehow. It’s the 
strongest feeling you give a girl, a sort of protect- 
edness. I’ve never felt absolutely protected be¬ 
fore—like this. I—I like it.” 

And Tom had never had anyone to protect be¬ 
fore—like this. He liked it too. This sole re¬ 
sponsibility for someone’s else safety, this warm¬ 
ing consciousness of someone’s complete trust. 
He wished they might go on interminably along 
this northward course, the night sea all around 
them, the night wind in their faces, the cleft 
waters singing past to foam and tumble in their 
wake. 

A big fishing schooner drew out of the dimness 
ahead, an old two-master beating her way south- 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 221 

ward on a long tack. “ Getting an early start 
with a load of mackerel for Boston markets/' Tom 
supposed. Emily gave up the wheel and leaned 
over the rail to watch the schooner pass. Her 
ruby port light winked at them as she swept by 
and they could hear the rush of water under her 
bows. 

Mr. Renny came tumbling forward to the 
bridge. “Gosh, that fellow startled me! First 
boat that's passed us to-night, either way. What 
time is it? " 

Frances was close at his heels. “ He never 
heard four bells a minute ago," she jeered, “ and 
a dozen boats could have come up on us if I hadn't 
kept watch. You’ve a lovely snore, Ted—sort of 
a tenor note that goes away up, the way McCor¬ 
mack does at the end of his songs." 

“ I have not been asleep one moment," asserted 
Mr. Renny indignantly. “ Fran is the one who 
had a snooze. She never even saw that passenger 
steamer that passed to starboard. Didn't one 
pass, I ask you, Emily? " 

“Certainly," laughed Emily, “since you ask 
me, Teddy, several of 'em passed both ways." 

“‘Fran,'" reflected the handy-man, “and 
‘ Emily.' " Nobody seemed to take offence either. 


222 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


Well, maybe Ted Renny could get away with it; 
he couldn’t. 

“Aren’t we ’most there?” inquired Frances, 
yawning. “ I’m so hungry but I suppose we can’t 
have breakfast till we’re at anchor. How much 
farther to Portland, Tom? ” 

They had come two-thirds of the way, she was 
told, and ought to make Portland by seven bells. 

“ That’s half-past three, isn’t it? And only just 
past two now. Goodness, what an endless night.” 

“ It’s an awful wide ocean to cross.” Mr. Renny 
contemplated the tumbling billows to eastward. 
“ Leagues and leagues of it. How far’s a league, 
Tom? ” 

“ A marine league is about three miles-” 

“ Ha! ” ejaculated Mr. Renny. “ Three miles, 
eh? Might call it the League of Nations—un¬ 
less,” he mentioned dismally, “ they decide on 
twelve.” 

Tom chuckled. Mr. Renny was now peering 
anxiously ahead. “ What’s that light off the star¬ 
board bow, Cap’n? Looks like another boat.” 

It was a boat, the skipper informed him: Port¬ 
land Lightship. Whereupon Mr. Renny, opin¬ 
ing that this anyhow was a craft they could pass 
without watchful fears, invited Frances to forage 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 223 


with him in the galley. Presently they emerged, 
each carrying a huge swiss cheese sandwich, and 
discovered their helmsman bending earnestly over 
the binnacle while Emily read aloud from a 
yachting manual propped up near the lantern. 

“ ‘ Get Cape Elizabeth lights N. W. and run 
for them until Halfway Rock bears N. E. by N. 
Then run N. by W. until you get Cape Elizabeth 
lights in range. Thus you are safely by Hue and 
Cry rocks and West Cod Ledge. Now steer N. W. 
by N. two and one-half miles and you are off 
Portland Head Light ’-” 

“ Sweet Daddy!” gasped Mr. Renny. “ No 
place for you and me, Frances. Let’s go back and 
finish our snooze. That is,” Mr. Renny offered 
politely, “unless I can help you some way, 
Tom-” 

“ Clear out! ” growled the skipper. And then 
called after them apologetically, “ This is no time 
for fooling. You be ready when the engine stops 
to hop for’ard to the anchor.” 

That night entry into Portland harbor Emily 
knew would remain one of the unforgettable ex¬ 
periences, one of the things that stand out as 
significant above lesser happenings. Still as a 
little mouse she crouched by the chart table, her 


224 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 
eyes on Tom. The glimmer of the binnacle lamp 
showed his face grim, intent, mouth set in a tight 
line as he studied alternately the chart, his com¬ 
pass and the gleam and flash of lights against the 
dark. 

All of her future, surety of life itself, it seemed 
to Emily, hung upon that something Tom was 
finding in his binnacle and its relation to those 
distant lights at which he was constantly glancing. 
Never again, she knew, would she look at the 
lights at night with indifference; they would al¬ 
ways have for her now some of the beauty and 
meaning they have for the sailor who sails the sea. 
She recalled trips she had made on Sound steamers 
between Boston and New York and her careless in¬ 
difference about the steady and flashing points of 
light far across the dark when she happened to 
wake up and glance through her stateroom win¬ 
dow. How much they meant—those lights, and 
how little the people who traveled to and fro, 
snug under their blankets, planning what they 
would do in town next day, heeded them. 

Never would she see a light again across dark 
water without wanting to know its name. And 
thereafter it would be a friend to look for next 
time she passed that way. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 225 


She followed Tom’s glance toward the white 
glow and red flash, glow and flash out in the black¬ 
ness northeastward. Halfway Rock, he called it. 
How much that great light meant to mariners 
coming into Portland night after night, year after 
year! She had a curious feeling that it marked 
a half-way place in her own life, between what 
had gone before and would come afterward—that 
great light that seemed such a vital factor of this 
hour of groping through the dark. 

She drew a long breath when presently Tom 
straightened up, faee relaxed and smiling. “ All 
right now! ” And she came back to the wheel and 
stood beside him. The bad ledges, Old Anthony 
and West Cod were safely past. That was Port¬ 
land Head, off to the left and across the channel 
Ram’s Island. Just a straight run now to Spring 
Point Ledge, up the safe pathway of the diamond 
white ray and between the red sectors that indi¬ 
cated perils at either side. 

“From gray sea fog, from icy drift, 

From peril and from pain, 

The home-bound fisher greets thy lights, 

0 hundred harbored Maine ! 9 9 

Tom was jubilant. “ We’ve done it, haven’t we? 
You helped, you know.” 

“ Next to the lights,” amended Emily. “ I’ve 


226 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

always thought of lighthouses as warnings to keep 
off the rocks, but the lights are really guides, 
aren’t they? Not warnings to keep out of trouble 
but guides to show you the way.” 

“You’ve got the idea, I reckon,” Tom replied. 
“ It’s following the lights, not dodging ’em, that 
takes us safe home.” 

Dawn was breaking as the Gleam crept around 
the end of the Portland breakwater. Far down in 
the eastern sky, against a pale primrose streak that 
heralded morning glittered a silver star. 

Tom gazed at it. “Aldeberan! I’ve heard peo¬ 
ple say it could be seen sometimes in July at dawn. 
It’s a winter star, you know.” He smiled down at 
her and noted how big and shadowy her eyes were 
in her white little face. “ You’re dead tired,” he 
said remorsefully. “But it’s been a great old 
night, hasn’t it? ” 

“ The greatest night in my life and the hap¬ 
piest—the very happiest, Tom.” The brown eyes 
smiling up at him were suddenly full of tears. 
Mr. Renny was running forward across the bow 
deck to put over the anchor. Tom’s hand, warm 
and strong and steady, caught hers as he turned 
from the wheel. 

“ Mine too,” he whispered. 


CHAPTER XX 


Any person who has stood for long hours be¬ 
hind the wheel of a small yacht, particularly if 
the cruise has been by night, knows that feeling 
of tremendous distance covered. Even though 
reason reminds that a fast train could have sped 
over the miles in brief time the sensation remains 
of a port of departure left far behind. 

Tom knew that this feeling possessed Emily 
when she came out to a late breakfast in frock and 
sport coat with soft coils of hair undisguised by 
the Brother Emerson cap. She announced her in¬ 
tention of going ashore with Cousin Phoebe who 
wanted to have a doctor look at the injured arm. 
It seemed best not to discard the sling without 
professional sanction. 

And of course they must see the Wadsworth 
Longfellow house, insisted Emily. It would be 
too dreadful to visit Portland without having a 
look at it. Frances elected to accompany Mr. 
Renny who deemed it wise before betaking him¬ 
self to any sea-begirt isle to stock up with type¬ 
writer ribbons, cigarettes and other essentials of 
the dramatist’s trade. 

The busy handy-man, however, had plenty to 
227 


228 J LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

do on and off the yacht. Ice to get. Gas to put 
in. Tinkering on the engine to be done. He re¬ 
minded Mr. Renny who emerged from the crew’s 
cubby very spruce in white flannels, whose job it 
was to carry the market baskets ashore. “ And 
take the big one/’ advised Tom. “ You want to 
stock up with several steaks and two dozen chops 
and all the stuff you can buy at the delicatessen 
place. We’re not likely to get much beside fish on 
that island. Bring a lot of fresh vegetables too. 
You better take both baskets- ” 

Mr. Renny looked dismayed. “All dolled up 
like this? Say, old thing, couldn’t you do the 
marketing? ” 

“ I could not,” said the handy-man firmly. 
“And it’s your job. Meet me at the post-office if 
you like and I’ll give you a lift with one of the 
baskets. You can park them at the market if your 
joy in Portland depends on escorting Frances 
round.” 

Tom himself would have liked to spend the 
morning escorting Emily round. He loved Port¬ 
land and wished he might have wandered with her 
through its elm-shaded streets where people never 
seemed to hurry and the fine old houses in their 
fine old gardens had such serenity and dignity. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 229 

Portland air always seemed to have a cleaner 
freshness than air in any other city. It made you 
breathe deep and feel light hearted and vigorous. 
Maine air, strong and salt and always with a sting 
of coolness in it. Perhaps this evening Emily and 
he could walk on the Eastern Promenade and look 
out over Casco Bay and the “ islands that were the 
Hesperides ” of Longfellow's boyish dreams. 

Emily. For the first time, that morning, Tom 
as he whistled about his work began to wonder 
whether a poor young engineer might not after all 
venture to have dreams. Two thousand dollars in 
bonds and a good job assured weren't so bad. A 
lot of fellows, at twenty-six, hadn't as much as 
that. Of course this chap who was after her was 
rich, but his money didn't attract her or she 
wouldn't be running away from him. Poor little, 
harassed, unhappy girl, she wanted something in 
a husband besides dollars. “ Protected"—she 
longed to feel protected. Well, if she'd give Tom 
MacLeod the right he'd protect her. To have her 
always to protect and take care of . . . Tom 

drew a long breath. 

When they got to that island he would get the 
story out of her. And tell her about Cliff and 
Celia- 


230 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Suddenly he stopped whistling and stood, 
wrench suspended in air. The thought of Celia 
brought reminder of the panel. 

Here he was, alone on the Gleam, with the day 
before him. A chance of chances to search for his 
mother’s message. 

But somehow he had a strange distaste for 
doing it. 

It came to him with a shock of surprise that 
the Vagabond now was less a reminder of cher¬ 
ished associations of the past than the background 
of very present living interests. He was happy 
on the Vagabond as he had never been in those 
old days. Never, then, anyone depending com¬ 
pletely on him. He tried to envision Cliff and 
Celia and old Saunders in their familiar places, 
but what he saw, eyes staring at a picture of 
Portland wharves framed by one of the engine- 
room ports, was a night sea and a distant light. 
Under his feet was the beat of the engine and 
close at his elbow a little woman thing- 

Comradeship! For the first time in all the years 
he could remember the total absence of loneli¬ 
ness. 

Nevertheless—he picked up the wrench that had 
dropped with a clatter—nevertheless he had to get 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 231 

that message of Celia’s. It was what he had 
taken the job for and now was the time, if ever. 
He selected screw-driver and chisel from the tool¬ 
box and walked aft to the cockpit. The cabin door 
stood open and from the doorway he could see the 
panel marked by the tiny swastika. It wouldn t 
take him a minute. . . . 

He went down the steps into the cabin. But 
this wasn’t Celia’s cabin any more—or Cliff’s. 
Cousin Phoebe’s embroidery trailed from her work- 
bag on the table. Orowlo’s basket stood in a cor¬ 
ner. And on the port transom was a coral and 
gold mandarin coat. Either he must kneel on that 
coat or shove it out of his way. And beside it 
her little sewing-basket and that blue swimming 
suit; she’d been mending it maybe. Yes, her 
sewing-basket, for in it was that vanity thing-a- 
ma-bub he’d found in the pocket of the red sport 
coat the day of the beach picnic. 

The Gleam’s handy-man retreated hastily from 
the cabin. Some other time he’d search back of 
the panel. He couldn’t, positively couldn’t do it 
this way: sneaking into the place and rummaging. 
He felt like a bounder, invading that feminine 
sanctuary. He couldn’t get back to the bow deck 
fast enough. 


232 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

But though he hadn’t brought with him papers 
hidden for him behind a panel, he had brought 
something else. Sitting on his pipe cot in the 
crew’s cubby he looked at it—a little vanity 
thing-a-ma-bub made of pink ribbon shirred up to 
imitate a rose. He drew out the tiny powder-puff 
and touched it ever so gently to his face. It 
smelled sweet—like some flower or other. The 
same fragrance lingered about her when you stood 
quite near her. 

What a fool stunt—to swipe a girl’s powder- 
puff, of all things! Yet chaps who had filched 
handkerchiefs had made sonnets about them, and 
if a handkerchief that only whisked across a nose, 
why not a powder-puff that had touched her 
cheek? And that pretty place under her chin. 
Celia had been given one of those ribbon things 
shaped like roses; it was to tuck in the bodice of a 
dance frock she had said. Maybe Emily had 
worn this one like that. Gosh, it was a priceless 
treasure, handkerchiefs be darned. 

He wrapped the priceless treasure carefully in a 
clean handkerchief and looked about for a safe 
place to stow it away. He’d like to keep it on him 
but of course that idiot, Renny, would spy it 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 233 

;when he undressed. So Tom locked it in the suit¬ 
case with his mother’s letter and then jumped in 
the tender and rowed, whistling, ashore. 

At the post-office he found letters forwarded by 
Mr. Avery and wrote the lawyer a brief note ask¬ 
ing that further mail be sent to Monhegan Island. 
While waiting for Ted Renny he read his letters. 
One was from old Malcolm Avery himself and 
contained the miraculous good news of five thou¬ 
sand dollars unexpectedly retrieved from an over¬ 
looked bit of property Celia had owned in Bridge¬ 
port. That was a heartening addition to Mac¬ 
Leod assets. The other letter was from his aunt 
Judith up in Newburgh, bidding him welcome 
home and asking him to come and visit her. Later 
he must be sure to go. 

“ Oh, here you are,” hailed the cheerful voice of 
Mr. Renny at his elbow. “ Left ’em snoopin’ 
round Mr. Longfellow’s house.” 

Cousin Phoebe had finally decided on a doctor, 
he reported, picking out the name she fancied 
most from what seemed to be an embarrassment 
of riches in the way of available medical advice. 
“ You’d think Portland was a healthy town,” 
quoth Mr. Renny, “until you see the doctors’ 


234 _ LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

shingles. Three to every block pretty near. Or 
maybe they have an extra high average of babies 
down here in Maine.” 

He accompanied Tom into the postmaster’s 
room where arrangements were to be made about 
forwarding mail to Monhegan. While Mr. Mac¬ 
Leod did the talking Mr. Renny prowled about, 
inspecting notices and advertisements tacked 
against the wall. Tom suspected he was flirting 
with a pretty girl who sat behind a typewriter, so 
frequent were the glances she sent at the engaging 
figure of Mr. Renny. Not many merry eyed 
young chaps in spick span flannels happened in 
her dull environment every day. 

But that there was motive in these apparently 
aimless wanderings Tom discovered. Mr. Renny 
was intrigued by a certain bit of paper pinned to 
the wall near the stenographer’s desk. It seemed 
to be a mimeographed notice of some sort and 
Tom wondered why Ted didn’t stand still and read 
the thing through if he was so interested in it. 
Fate, however, assisted Mr. Renny. There was 
sound of commotion outside and the clang of a 
fire-engine gong. The stenographer sprang from 
her chair and rushed to the window and in that 
same instant Tom saw Mr. Renny deftly remove 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 235 


the paper from its pin, shove it in his pocket and 
slide out of the room. 

He had vanished when Tom came out of the 
post-office but arriving at the dock (laden with 
both market baskets) Mr. MacLeod found Frances 
and Cousin Phcebe in a high state of indigna¬ 
tion. 

“ Ted asked us to meet him for lunch," stated 
Frances wrathfully, “ and when he got there he 
grabbed Emily by the arm and rushed her off as 
if she were the only person in this party of any 
consequence. Said he wanted to show her some¬ 
thing.^ 

“ And he ordered me —ordered me to take my 
arm out of the sling," added Cousin Phcebe, 
“ when he knew how nervous I'd be in the street 
with people bumping into me. I don't know 
what got into him." 

“ Here he is with the tender," Tom pointed 
across the water. 

“ What's up? " Tom whispered as he helped 
the Gleam 1 s steward stow the baskets in the boat. 

“ Enough and plenty," growled Mr. Renny with 
a glare of warning. “ I've taken Emily out to the 
yacht. Get the rest of 'em aboard and make it 
snappy.” 


236 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


In the engine room a few minutes later he 
showed Tom the crumpled paper. It was a 
mimeographed notice addressed to “ Postmasters.” 
What there was of it, as Mr. Renny had hinted, 
seemed to be enough and plenty: 

“You are requested to watch for the following 
person or persons who may inquire at your office for 
mail. Emily Nugent Geggie, twenty years old, height, 
five feet six inches, weight, about 125 pounds. Dark 
chestnut hair, brown eyes, vivacious, imperious per¬ 
sonality. Believed to be in company of Phoebe Hage- 
boom, middle-aged, stout, carries arm in sling. 

$500 reward is offered for information leading to 
discovery of whereabouts of these persons. This no¬ 
tice is for post-office officials only and is not for public 
posting as the matter is confidential. ’ ’ 

Followed the address of a legal firm in the city 
of Buffalo. 

Surprisingly enough Emily did not seem seri¬ 
ously disturbed over the post-office notice. Both 
Tom and Ted Renny agreed that it must be 
handed to her at once. This was not a thing they 
could fairly keep from her even to save her worry. 
But when she read it she looked relieved. She 
turned to Frances. " It proves there isn’t a sus¬ 
picion about the yacht. These notices have evi¬ 
dently been sent to all the big cities. I knew he’d 
never think of the yacht! Uncle would, for he 
knew how crazy I was about this boat. But Uncle 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 237 

won’t be back before the end of August. We’re 
safe till then-” 

“ Mightn’t your uncle suggest the yacht in a 
cable? ” demurred Frances. 

Emily shook her head. “ He’d be on my side 
enough to keep still even if he did suspect. If I 

can only wait till Uncle gets home-” She 

turned to Ted Renny. “ You’re sure no one fol¬ 
lowed you when you took the notice? ” 

Mr. Renny was positive. He took great pride 
in his generalship: hustling the wanted persons 
separately out of the locality. 

“ Phoebe and I shouldn’t have gone ashore to¬ 
gether,” she sighed, “but it did seem so many 
miles from home. Anyhow no one who saw us 
would connect us with the Gleam ” 

Tom glanced at Cousin Phoebe. He was think¬ 
ing of that picnic on the beach and the man and 
woman who had evinced such interest in the coin¬ 
cidence of brown-eyed girl and stout lady with 
disabled arm in each other’s company. Those two 
at any rate connected the party with the Gleam. 
It looked as though one of them might have been 
a post-office employee. And the eye-glass case 
they had failed to return contained the name and 
address of Miss Phoebe Hageboom. 


238 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

It seemed to Tom now that Emily ought to be 
told about the missing eye-glass case but Cousin 
Phoebe’s pale blue eyes meeting his in shocked 
recollection of the incident, implored him not to 
break his promise. She drew him aside when he 
left the cabin to go forward and start his engine. 
“ I can’t bear to have her know I was so careless,” 
Cousin Phoebe moaned. “ She’d never forgive me, 
Tom. It would”—the poor little stout lady 
dabbed at her eyes with her handkerchief—“ it 
would just spoil the trip for me.” 

As the Gleam swung out past Peak’s Island the 
helmsman found himself pondering over that 
name, Geggie. Her name, and Doris Twombly 
had known it! But why in time did he dislike the 
sound of it so? What or whom did it remind him 
of? And why did it seem connected with his 
childhood? 


CHAPTER XXI 


Monhegan —isle of enchantment. To those 
who have known its spell; who have breathed the 
tonic of its air; who have fared with the morning 
across its wind-swept downs and lingered in gra¬ 
cious afternoons amid its forest aisles; who have 
listened to the sea's thunder on its ledges and 
dreamed beneath some brooding cedar atop a turf- 
carpeted cliff, spirit following vision unto 

. . . the distance dim. 

Where the white flutter of a friendly sail 
Gives greeting, ere it sinks beneath the rim, 

to these will come with each recurring summer a 
wistful longing to go back. 

The days came and went. Bright days when 
the sea was blue and gulls shrieking and settling 
on the harbor rocks gleamed dazzling white, when 
flowers made brilliant patches of color against 
weather-beaten houses and sunshine turned to 
gold old lobster traps on silver, sparkling sands. 
Days when great winds blew and Tom and Emily 
sat spellbound on the ledges watching white- 
flecked green seas thunder and crash and break in 
239 


240 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

tumult of foam. Days when ocean fogs shut 
them in and the tiny steamer from the mainland 
crept warily round the point, and the great fog¬ 
horn on Manana sent its hoarse warning across 
the waters. 

The two made pilgrimages—to Blackhead to 
watch wild seas beat against the cliffs; to the 
cathedral woods where surge of the sea and surge 
of the wind in the pine tops chanted an antiphonal 
chorus; to the lighthouse where they climbed the 
stairs and touched awesomely the shining fixtures 
of the great light. They bathed in the icy sea—a 
valorous plunge, a frantic scramble back to the 
swimming ladder, a gasping recovery of breath on 
deck, and then all day exhilarated vitality so that 
they skimmed the downs with a sense of being 
bodiless, tireless. 

Tom stored his handy-man’s jumper away and 
roamed the island decently in white flannels. 
Every morning he went down to the wharf with 
his tin pail and waited, with the smocked artists, 
for the little steamer that fetched milk from the 
mainland. Mr. Benny’s typewriter clicked madly 
through the hours and Frances stood guard over 
burning genius, glaring at any member of the 
ship’s company who raised a voice in that vicinity. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 241 

But at eventide the playwright descended to 
status of good cook and served agreeable dinners. 
They dined inside the cabin now and chef and 
handy-man added, if less distinction from a yacht¬ 
ing standpoint, vastly more hilarity to the feast. 
Afterward Mr. Benny read them bits from his 
drama or they played bridge with ports closed and 
a fire in the galley stove to keep off the chill. On 
warmer nights (rare at Monhegan) they sat on 
deck and Mr. Renny sang to them. 

Emily sang too. And often she sang to herself, 
little snatches of gay tunes that Tom heard as he 
passed the deck house windows and smiled hap¬ 
pily because he knew that she was happy. And 
though he could not sing, singing words were 
often in Tom's mind. For days he could not 
place the thing that haunted him—lines that kept 
running with lilting joyousness through his head 
while he polished the yacht's brasses or swabbed 

the deck mornings. An island thing- Then 

he remembered: Le Gallienne's Bahaman Song. 

And love shall be the island laws, 

Love all its business, all its play, 

The world and all its silly saws 
A foolish legend, far away. 

Each day were Emily and Tom drawing closer 


242 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

to each other. He knew and she knew. And 
both knew that the time was approaching when 
there would have to be admission of it between 
them. Sometimes it seemed—that breathless 
moment—to be upon them but always to Tom's 
bewilderment it was gone, flickering ahead like 
some will-o’-the-wisp that would not be overtaken 
and caught. Emily had signed a truce with worry 
and made a compact with play—that seemed to be 
it. Time enough for serious things; this pleasant 
playtime was too good to spoil. Ever she avoided 
the personal and when he tried to pin her down 
she was off and away, an elusive something in her 
flitting as lightly from his determination as her 
bodily self flitted over the ledges, laughing eyes 
daring him to pursue her. 

She knew all about him now; he told her one 
night when they sat on the cliff watching the 
moon rise over the rim of the ocean. She liked to 
go at dusk over the hill beyond the lighthouse to a 
special nook they had discovered, a flat rock where 
they could sit, backs against the cliff with the sea 
murmuring a hundred feet below; and where they 
could watch, when at minute intervals the great 
flash gleamed across the dark, the play of light 
along the ledges. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 243 


“ Out there,” she pointed to the red and green 
glimm er on a ship beating in from the southeast, 
“ they don't see the ledges—only the big light.” 

He smil ed, understanding her thought. “ They 
don’t have to bother about the ledges. They’re 
looking ahead now for the next light—Pemaquid. 
And after that, Seguin. When that fellow sees 
our Monhegan flash he knows he is only four hours 

from home and supper and the kids-” 

“You’re always talking about getting home, 
Tom. Home means a lot to you, doesn’t it? ” 

He was filling his pipe, tamping down the 
tobacco with a finger. Home, to him, meant 
Emily, but he dared not say it. If he did she 
would spring up in that way of hers of avoiding 
issues and spoil their happy moment. So he 
smoked in silence, watching the green speck of 
light on the schooner creep westward until it dis¬ 
appeared behind the jutting point of old White- 
head. 

“ What do you think is the best thing life can 
give? ” she asked presently, snuggling her shoul¬ 
ders down to more comfortable position against 
the cliff and getting out her cigarette case. 
Brother Emerson had taught her the unfortunate 
habit and now she could start a cigarette without 


244 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


strangling over the initial puff. Tom noticed that 
whenever she was annoyed with him the cigarette 
case, which he detested, came out of her pocket. 
Sometimes she teased him and sometimes she pro¬ 
voked him but Tom knew how sweet she could be. 

He drew at his pipe imperturbably. “What 
do you? ” 

“ Freedom. Lack of responsibility about other 
people’s lives.” 

There he disagreed with her. His idea was ex¬ 
actly the opposite; ties, and responsibility for 
people who were near and dear had been his wist¬ 
ful longing all his twenty-six years. He said 
aloud: 

“ Then you only want to skim life, Emily; not 
to find its real meaning.” 

She pitched the unfinished cigarette over the 
ledge. 

“Maybe. I’m skimming it now, I suppose. 
And I find skimming very satisfactory.” 

“Do you?” The great light behind them 
streamed out and he turned and looked into her 
face. “ But it can’t last long like this, you know, 
my dear.” 

The hard look in her eyes softened. 

“ Tom, let it! ” she whispered. “ I want it to 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 245 

last—just as long as we can.” Then she changed 
the subject hastily. “ Did you ever see the ocean 
so still? It’s like—like a great quiet breast 
breathing. Hear the little sigh after every breath, 
down there where the water laps up on the rocks.” 

Flood tide, he explained. And a windless night. 
Didn’t she remember, in “ Crossing the Bar ”: 

“. . . such a tide as moving, seems asleep, 

Too full for sound and foam, 

When that which drew from out the boundless 
deep 

Turns again home.” 

“Turns again home,” she repeated. “There 
you go again, Tom. Home’s the last place I want 
to be reminded of.” (Truly she was in a contrary 
mood to-night.) Instantly, however, she was 
contrite and it was the irresistibly sweet way of 
her to reach over and touch his hand with hers. 
“Always thinking about Emily, isn’t she? I 
know what you mean about home, old dear, but 
you see I can’t go home—I haven’t any home to 
go to-” 

“ Nor I, Emily.” 

“You!” 

“ Not a soul on earth I can call my own.” 

“ Tom! ” She moved up closer beside him on 


246 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

the rock, slipping her hand, warm and comforting, 
into his. “ Tell me about it.” 

So he told her—about the schools and the sum¬ 
mer camps and his war year and the three years 
in India. About Cliff and Celia and their happi¬ 
ness, and the studio in New York where a cot was 
put up for him during his brief visits. He did not 
tell her about the Vagabond . He could not tell 
her yet that it was his father’s yacht they were 
living on. Or about the panel. She would insist 
upon instant search and his faith with Celia must 
be kept. But it was comforting, with the warm 
little hand nestling in his, to tell about himself 
and his boyhood. And the things that because of 
those homeless, wistful years he craved, he knew— 
by the close pressure of her hand, she understood. 

Then she told him about her own girlhood; the 
death of her father when she was eleven and the 
after years when she traveled about with a gay- 
hearted, pleasure-loving little mother. California 
and Palm Beach in the winters. Dashes to Paris 
in springtime for clothes. Dashes to New York 
in the autumn for theatres. “ I never had time 
to go to school regularly,” said Emily, “but we 
did have grand times, Mummy and I. We were 
as happy as birds. Then she died—two years ago 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 247 

—and I went to live with my uncle in Buffalo. 
I couldn't bear it. Uncle is kind—if I could have 
him all by himself. Mummy was his little sister 
and he understood her—and me. But his wife, 
my aunt Adeline,—oh horrors! One of those 
Seventh Day Baptists. Everything I wanted was 
wrong. Everything I loved was contemptible. 
Even Ming—that woman wouldn't let me have 
Ming in the house and Mummy had babied him so 
he couldn't understand. Many a night I've slept 
out in the garage with him. And her two daugh¬ 
ters, Hannah and Martha,—can't you see them, 
with those names? Hating my pretty clothes and 
my boy friends dropping around in roadsters to 
take me to the country club. And then, Perci- 
val-" 

“ Who's Percival? " Tom shot this before she 
could catch her breath. 

“ Their brother—my cousin. He's worst, the 
sanctimonious kind trying to make love on the 
siy." 

So there was a brother Percival—that kind. 
Tom thought now they were getting somewhere. 

“ Percy really disliked me—and all my ways. 
But there was Mummy's money. Not so much, 
but I suppose he had his eye on it. He pretended 


248 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

he wanted to reform me. Odious! Going to 
Aunt Adeline with tales about me and the set I 
played with out at the club. I know Uncle 
wanted me to care for Percy. I’d like to have 
pleased Uncle but I couldn’t do it. And so—and 
so-” 

She stopped short and after her hurried speech, 
the words tumbling along and indignation making 
her voice higher than its usual low contralto note, 
the silence was sudden and complete. The sea 
breathed and sighed against the rocks. The big 
light flashed out and showed the ledges rimmed 
with gold. 

“ And so,” remarked Tom, “ you ran away.” 

“ Yes . . . I ran away,” she finished rather 

flatly. Very obviously there was something left 
out. Something rather important. But she had 
told all she intended to—for the present. She got 
up, shook her skirts and said it was time to get 
back to the Gleam . And all the way home she 
chattered about inconsequent things. 

But Tom thought he could fit the pieces to¬ 
gether, smoking his pipe on the bow deck before 
turning in. Uncle wanted her to marry the 
sanctimonious Percival. Perhaps, as trustee of 
her fortune the uncle desired to keep it in the 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 249 


family. Some pressure had been brought to bear 
on her, or they had some hold over her and she 
had been forced into a promise to this Percival. 
It was he, of course, who had sent out the mimeo¬ 
graphed notice and whom she intended to evade 
until her uncle returned from Europe. 

Yes, the pieces seemed to fit pretty well. There 
was an odd bit that didn't seem to fit; Tom 
couldn't imagine what should cause such overpow¬ 
ering fear of that Seventh Day Baptist suitor. It 
didn't seem reasonable to be so terrified of such a 
fellow. And not only Emily was afraid, but also 
Cousin Phcebe and Frances. (Who of course Tom 
now knew, was no sister Frances but a devoted 
girl chum.) Tom almost hoped this Percival 
would put in an appearance. The MacLeod could 
settle him all right. 

The more one thought of it, this fear of pursuit 
did seem exaggerated—a little hysterical. The 
yacht was Emily's, bought with money invested 
for her by her uncle. Suddenly a dark possibility 
flashed across the MacLeod mind: how had she 
secured funds to finance such an expedition? It 
cost something to run the Gleam (even without 
weekly wage for a crew) and Emily, according to 
Cousin Phoebe, had not a large allowance from 


250 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

her guardian. Unpleasant suggestions anent rifled 
safes, raised checks and forged avuncular signa¬ 
tures darted through Tom's mind. The weaker 
sex when it was determined on getting its own 
way was prone to ride over all obstacles. 

But anything like that he simply couldn't at¬ 
tribute to her. His wonderful girl. Or to Frances 
either. He was ashamed of himself for even 
thinking of it. . . . 

“ What's that, Tom? " hissed Mr. Renny, pok¬ 
ing a disheveled head through the hatch. 

“ What's what? " inquired Mr. MacLeod who 
was knocking out his pipe. 

“ Didn't you see that launch? " 

“ Launch? " repeated Tom vaguely. 

“ It's been all the way around us three times. 
Just slipped aft down the port side." 

“ Ted, old bean, you've got launches on the 
brain." The Renny head ducked as Tom's long 
legs slid through the hatch. “ That's the third 
launch that's worried you this week. The har¬ 
bor's free, you know.” 

Tom was unlacing his deck shoes. “ I've told 
you what I decided about those launches back at 
Squam and Marblehead. They'd nothing to do 
with that post-office business. Somebody got sus- 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 251 


picious because the Gleam looked almighty like a 
yacht with another name and we are cruising 
without a club pennant. Either they got tired or 
else we gave 'em the slip." 

“ That's what you think." Mr. Renny hunched 
up his blanket. 

“ There isn't anything else to think. You're 
looking for trouble, Teddy, me lad." 

“ Blowed if I'm not," grunted Mr. Renny, and 
rolled himself up in the blanket. 

He was right. It came next day. 


CHAPTER XXII 


An excruciating experience, Cousin Phoebe pro¬ 
nounced it afterward. And for a whole week Mr. 
Renny who had (with the most innocent inten¬ 
tions, he insisted) plunged them into it, was sent 
to Coventry. 

The day had opened auspiciously. The great 
play was finished and the manuscript, cherishingly 
wrapped and corded, was borne to the wharf after 
lunch to be delivered to the express company’s 
representative. Frances carried the play and Mr. 
Renny staggered under the load of one of the 
green-painted boxes. His typewriter also was 
voyaging. He thought he might as well ship the 
thing home now as he didn’t intend to do another 
lick of work and it would cheer the old man to 
note arriving luggage. “Show him I’m on the 
way,” observed Mr. Renny kindly, “ even if he 
doesn’t quite get from where. I’ll forward the 
boxes one at a time. Dad loves a good joke.” 

So the green box and the play departed together 
and the Gleam’s steward, in high spirits, prepared 
the evening meal. Cousin Phoebe, now that she 
could use her arm, liked to potter in the galley 
and frequently had dinner well under way when 
the young folks came trekking back from some 
252 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 253 


expedition ashore. To-day she had made a pud¬ 
ding which Tom and Emily were contemplating 
with awe as it stood on the shelf that did duty as 
a sideboard. In the galley the lovely tenor of 
Mr. Penny was caroling “Yes, we have no 
bananas,” as he banged saucepans about. It had 
come on to rain and ports were closed against the 
dreary evening. Cousin Phoebe, who was setting 
the table, suddenly straightened up. 

“ Who’s that? ” 

Emily went white as chalk at the sound of foot¬ 
steps on deck. The steward, appearing in the 
galley doorway, had a startled expression. Tip¬ 
toeing across, he peered through a port. 

“Holy mackerel!—we’re pinched,” he ejacu¬ 
lated, and ducking through forward cabin and 
engine room he disappeared in the crew’s cubby. 

And then occurred the excruciating experience. 

They were searched. Ignominiously searched 
fore and aft, from sampson post to lazyback. Not 
even Miss Phoebe’s maiden suitcase escaped the 
desecrating hands of the determined persons (one 
of them had a red beard) who seemed to have 
some preposterous notion that the Gleam was har¬ 
boring spirituous contraband. And shipping it to 
grocers,—hadn’t one case gone to-day to a firm 


254 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

that manufactured pickles and sauces for table 

use? 

At this moment Tom’s ears heard a faint splash 
up forward. 

The intruders regretted discommoding the 
ladies. They felt extremely sorry about that, but 
they had had the yacht under surveillance some 
time and in the proper performance of their duty 
it was necessary to make a complete search. . . . 

Another splash up forward. 

Emily, cheeks very red and chin very high (but 
eyes as Tom could discern showing distinct relief 
that the intruders were not on more personal busi¬ 
ness) bade them go ahead and search if they 
wanted to. It was too ridiculous to attribute 
bootlegging enterprises to her yacht. 

“ Where’s the one that had the shack up Indian 
River?” demanded the red-bearded man. “He 
was aboard just now.” 

Tom had heard another splash—but six green 
boxes had been brought aboard. He hoped Ted 
would have time. The young cub! He’d fix him 
for this. 

But when the search party reached the crew’s 
cubby (where the steward was shaving) and 
pounced on a green-painted box in plain view, the 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 255 

yanked-off lid revealed an assortment of wires, 
plugs, bulbs and other items of a dismantled radio 
outfit. What was eatin’ the fellers anyhow? 
Mr. Renny wondered. Sure, he’d sent home some 
of the boxes! The one to-day with his type¬ 
writer, and others with books and track outfits. 
His father was a sort of grocer, yes. He made 
pickles. Could you beat it? asked Mr. Renny. 

But when the launch had vanished in the rain 
he mopped his brow with a dish-towel. “ Gosh, 
that was a near squeak,” he confided to Frances. 
She turned her back on him. Frigid silence met 
Mr. Renny’s outburst of apologetic explanation. 
The orbs of Frances regarded him balefully, those 
of Cousin Phoebe with tearful reproach. 

Of course he had never dreamed his silly stunt 
would start anything like that, he told them. The 
boxes had been found cached on a lonesome beach, 
salvage for anybody who discovered them since 
in a matter of such unnegotiable merchandise 
none might with safety accuse another. He was 
going to send the stuff to the old man, he said- 
sort of a peace offering before he blew in. The 
old boy would be tickled pink at the priceless 
surprise (“ genuine Scotch if you’ll believe me.” 
Sotto voce to Tom who remained unimpressed.) 


256 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

and the prodigal would get off scot free so far 
as reproaches anent his vagrant summer were con¬ 
cerned. 

“ That’s all over now/’ he sighed. “ But any¬ 
how a couple of quarts traveled with that type¬ 
writer this morning.” 

Cousin Phoebe’s pale blue eyes regarded him 
unhappily. “ I do hope, Teddy, college didn’t 
turn you into a steady drinker-” 

Mr. Renny reassured her. “ Don’t worry, Miss 
Phoebe. These days there ain’t any steady drink¬ 
ers. Only ”—he winked solemnly at Tom— 
“ only Volsteady drinkers.” 

By the end of the week, however, Mr. Renny 
was back in their good graces. His sunny charm 
could not be resisted indefinitely and his chastened 
mood touched their hearts. Frances and he began 
to spend their days on one of the old mackerel 
schooners whose kindly skipper allowed summer 
folk to go along when he approved their manners 
aboard. They came back at sunset bronzed by 
wind and sun and reminiscing about the wedges of 
apple pie the schooner’s cook had handed out and 
the thrilling moments when a school of mackerel 
had been sighted and boats were sent out to spread 
the nets. Sometimes on these bright afternoons 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 257 


Tom took the Gleam out into the sparkling ocean 
and they loafed about to eastward of the island, 
within sight of its majestic headlands and the 
sentinel lighthouse rising above the cliffs. 

In the second week of August the bright 
weather ended. Ragged clouds came scudding up 
from eastward and the ocean boomed at night 
against the cliffs. There was a moaning sound in 
the pine tops in cathedral woods. Old fishermen 
prophesied an early sou’easter this year. Tom, 
coming on deck before breakfast, spied a new 
boat in the harbor. For a fortnight the Gleam 
had been the only yacht anchored among fishing 
craft and launches of the summer residents, and 
he looked with some curiosity at the handsome 
cruiser that had come in. Then he recognized it 
as the Twombly yacht. 

Mr. Renny had recognized it too and there was 
some good-natured ragging at breakfast, but Mr. 
MacLeod was the only one who looked annoyed. 
Emily smiled serenely. Doris Twomblys didn’t 
signify with her now, the little secret smile said. 
She asked Tom if he wanted to walk to Squeaker 
Rock after lunch; the east wind must be blowing 
up a fine surf over there. She had been avoiding 
walks alone with him for a week and he was in 


258 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

the state of any yearning lover held at arm’s 
length by feminine caprice and desperately anx¬ 
ious to have the words over and done with that 
should put an end to uncertainties and bring peace 
of mind. 

He passed Miss Twombly as he swung happily 
down to his tender with the morning mail but she 
only nodded brightly and continued her conversa¬ 
tion with the people who were with her. The 
Loafalong seemed to have a large party aboard. 
Tom thought they had put in to ride out the storm 
that was surely on the way. 

Ted Renny, at luncheon, had great news to 
impart. The play had been accepted! Not, how¬ 
ever, as he had fondly hoped, by a famous pro¬ 
ducer. His agent wrote that five of these beings 
had turned it down but a motion picture concern 
saw promise in it (if their continuity writer did a 
little doctoring,) and Mr. Renny was urged to 
come at once to New York. 

“ I’ll not consent,” stormed the indignant 
dramatist, glaring around the lunch table. “ The 
hounds even suggest changing my title. Movies! 
—pah.” Did they imagine he was going to have 
his play—his really intellectual play that he’d 
slaved at all summer hashed up into a five reel 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 259 

thriller for plumbers and their best girls to haw- 
haw and boohoo over? Holy cats! 

“ Don’t break the dishes, honey.” Frances 
rescued a teacup that was bouncing off the table 
as a belligerent playwright banged his fist. “And 
it’s a lot of money, Ted.” 

It was a lot of money and Mr. Renny, looking 
meaningly at Frances, opined it could be used. At 
any rate it would defer consideration of pickles 
for a good long time and meanwhile one could do 
other plays. So Mr. Renny sent off a telegram by 
the afternoon boat advising his agent that he 
would run down to New York by next evening’s 
train. Of course he would come back, he replied 
to Emily’s anxious glance; this party on the Gleam 
couldn’t lose him yet a while. So Emily, eyes 
relieved and happy again, repaired to the cabin to 
make ready for her walk. Frances and Ted Renny 
immediately set out on a long hike to Pulpit Rock. 
They must make the most of every minute, 
Frances said, if Ted was to be gone four whole 
days. Tom smiled as he watched them up the 
road; there wasn’t much doubt about the ending 
of that affair. He rowed back to the Gleam after 
putting them ashore and went up to the bow deck 
to smoke a pipe while waiting for Emily. 


260 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

The harbor had a bleak look and the Gleam's 
motion was more pronounced than usual. Long 
swells were coming in from the sea and though 
the sun was shining the sky was misted over with 
wispy lengths of cloud with curled-up ends—sure 
sign of rain coming. Over on the Loajalong the 
sun struck something vividly yellow. It was the 
sport coat he had noticed on Doris Twombly that 
morning. She was standing at the rail and had a 
glass leveled at the Gleam . What the deuce was 
she looking at, and what business was it of hers 
anyway? He detested that girl! 

Now she was fiddling with ropes of the signal 
mast. What on earth was she doing—amusing 
herself by hauling signals up and down? Non¬ 
sense, she was too experienced a yachtswoman for 
that. And neither was she amusing her guests; 
she seemed to be alone at her foolishness. Well, 
now she had her signal or whatever it was, hoisted. 
Tom recognized the International Code symbols of 
ball, cone, and drum but the combination was un¬ 
intelligible without the code book. He wasn’t 
very curious. Emily was a long time. This after¬ 
noon he was going to pin her down, make her tell 
him whether there was any hope for him. No, by 
Jove, he knew there was—from her eyes! They 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 261 

were not going to drop away from his any more, 
hidden by her lashes. And they were not going 
to laugh at him and tease him any more. This 
time he’d make them look straight into his. 
Sweet eyes—and sweeter lips. Not another min¬ 
ute was he going to be played with. He’d- 

The yellow coat on the Loajalong was at the 
rail again. And the leveled glasses too. By the 
great horn spoon, was that girl impudent enough 
to be signaling him f He stared hard at the combi¬ 
nation on the mast behind her. It looked like this: 


Tom got up and, sauntering to the bridge, 
hunted up his yachting manual in the chart locker. 
It was plain enough, symbols 2—3 and 3—2—4: 

You are running into danger. 

The enemy is in sight. 

More of that girl’s mockery. Probably she 
thought she was funny. If she imagined she 
could arouse even irritation in him by these crude 
attempts at humor she was mightily mistaken. 
He saw Emily coming up the deck and hurried to 
meet her at the steps. 

As they rowed ashore he glanced toward the 
Loaf along „ The signals had been taken down. 



CHAPTER XXIII 

“ Tom —tell me some more about those an¬ 
chors.’ J 

Emily sat, feet curled under her, high up on 
Squeaker Rock. The sea boomed against the cliff 
a hundred feet below. Ear out, a steamer’s smoke 
made a long streak against the horizon. Emily 
wore to-day a white woolly coat and a silver ribbon 
was banded across her forehead and around her 
hair. Behind her was the dense green of cedars. 
Tom thought she looked, in her white coat and 
with the silver ribbon above her dark eyes, like 
some sprite of the woods come out on this high 
rock to view the sea. 

“ Anchors? ” he repeated vaguely. 

“ Yes—those anchors that hold us fast when the 
big gales come. I’ve been thinking a lot about 
them. Tom, when you said that: about having 
the right kind of anchor, did you mean—God? ” 

“Why”—he was trying to recall their talk 
on the sands, weeks ago—“ I suppose I did. Or 
maybe I meant character, or will. The thing that 
keeps us from going adrift.” 

262 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 263 


“ But you said 1 a strength not outside our¬ 
selves/ That would be will, wouldn’t it, not 
God? Some wills”—she sighed—“make pretty 
weak anchors.” 

“ But surely God is not a strength outside our¬ 
selves! Isn’t God, rather, the very best in our¬ 
selves? That Something in us able to resist, if we 
call on It, impulses to drift or to evade what we 
have to face.” Tom spoke shyly. He had never 
been one to talk about such things, even in France 
where the other fellows had thrashed out these 
subjects. “ Isn’t it God inside us—the God-part 
of us, that makes us strong to resist things? A— 
a sort of anchor we can throw out when a big gale 
threatens. I suppose that’s what I meant.” 

Her eyes were following the trail of smoke out 
at the ocean’s rim. 

“ I think it is very cruel of God,” she whispered 
passionately, “ when a big gale comes and a little 
ship isn’t strong enough—to let it smash on the 
rocks.” 

“ But don’t you see, Emily, that is putting God 
outside again; shuffling off personal responsibility 
on Him? We have to do our own preventing. 
If we go adrift it’s because our anchor wasn’t 
enough of a dependence. We weren’t gripping 


264 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


close enough on a strength that would hold us 
fast. I reckon in every one of us is an anchor big 
enough, and in every gale a strength to grip—that 
would hold us. But the anchor must be fast to 
the strength before the gale strikes.” 

She looked forlornly over the sea. “ I don’t 
want to be responsible for myself. I don’t want 
to fight gales.” Suddenly she turned and buried 
her face on Tom’s shoulder. “ I want some other 
anchor,” she sobbed. “ Mine isn’t any good. I 
don’t want to do my own preventing and deciding. 
I’m so—tired.” 

“ Emily! ” His arms went round her. 

But she drew away and sprang to her feet. 
“ It’s raining. Come—we’ve got to hurry.” 

From a ragged cloud overhead a smart spatter 
of rain beat on the rock and on the tops of the 
trees behind them. She caught his hand and 
made him run with her. It was a long trail, first 
through underbrush and stunted cedars and then 
down the aisles of the cathedral woods. The rain 
came pelting at them even under the thick pine 
branches. Tom tore off his coat and they ran, 
holding the coat above their heads, until they 
arrived, breathless, at a clump of cedars near the 
road. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 265 


Emily laughed. “ We’re exactly like that old 
painting,—the man and the girl fleeing before 
the storm. Only instead of a silly gauze scarf we 
have your good old coat. It’s sopping wet, Tom.” 

He put it on over his wet shirt. The rain was 
driving in silver sheets outside their shelter and 
they huddled close under the cedars. 

“Your face is sopping wet, too.” He took a 
folded handkerchief from his pocket and wiped 
the raindrops from her cheeks. She was still 
panting from her run and her eyes, laughing up 
into his, were very bright. 

“ Emily! ” he whispered. “ I love you. I love 
you.” 

He drew her close, his cheek—wet too with the 
rain—pressing against hers. He felt her sway 
against him and when he lifted his head she lay 
in his arms, her eyes closed. The rain dripped 
through the cedar branches on his head, stooped 
low over her face. 

“ Dearest, look at me! ” 

She shook her head, her eyes still closed. 

“ Emily, I love you. Do you love me? ” 

Her dark eyes opened and in their sweet wonder 
he read his answer. He crushed his lips on hers 
aiid her arms in the white coat-sleeves went up and 


266 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

clung about his neck. He did not know how long 
he held her so, but when at last he raised his head 
a sunbeam slanting through the trees was touching 
her hair. The spurt of rain was over and only 
drops from the cedar branches thudded on the 
needle-carpeted ground. Tom still held her fast. 
Her head was buried against his coat now and he 
stroked very gently the waves of her hair. Tom's 
gray eyes were beautiful as he looked down at the 
brown head nestling in his shoulder. His little 
girl. His! To take care of. To guard forever. 
He had won her—she was his! 

It came to him that he had not heard her utter 
a word. He must hear her say it. He bent and 
whispered, “You love me, Emily, don't you, 
dear? " 

“Yes, Tom." A muffled voice against his 
sleeve. 

“ Forever, Emily? You’re going to let me take 
care of you always? " 

“ And face things for me? " Her hands gripped 
his sleeve. 

“ Of course, my dearest." 

“ And find a way out-" Suddenly she stood 

away from him. There was a great light in her 
eyes. “Oh, you will!—you will. You are so 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 267 


strong and so wise, I know—I know you’ll find a 
way, Tom.” 

“ Why, of course,” said young Tom capably. 
He buttoned the white coat closer under her chin, 
his fingers trembling as they touched her throat. 
After this she was his to take care of, against the 
world. “Of course, my dear. You’re not to 
worry any more about anything.” 

They came down the hill hand in hand. Tom 
talked to her about his work and its promise. 
What a winter they would have out in Wyoming 
where she would come with him of course ! 
They’d have roaring wood fires in the evening 
when he got home to her. And they would ride 
over the trails and through the canyons. He’d 
teach her to ski. . . . 

She said scarcely a word all the way back to the 
Gleam but he didn’t notice, he was too happy. 

His high mood continued through dinner. 
He made absurd jokes and laughed at the non¬ 
sense of Mr. Renny who was foretelling with dis¬ 
mal detail the coming battle of genius seeking to 
protect its own against the onslaught of the movie 
horde. 

Miss Phoebe said very little. Her pale blue 
eyes, anxious and unhappy, went again and again 


268 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

to Emily’s face. But Emily was gay too, flushed 
and bright-eyed and merry over Mr. Renny’s non¬ 
sense. She never looked at Cousin Phoebe once 
—and only once at Frances. That was when 
Frances, on her way to fetch something from the 
inner cabin, suddenly paused behind Emily’s chair 
and putting her hands beneath Emily’s chin bent 
her chum’s face back so that the brown eyes had 
to meet hers. 

Tom saw Frances shake her head as her eyes 
smiled down into Emily’s. Then her hands 
brushed Emily’s cheeks caressingly as she moved 
away. There had been something of sadness in 
the little shake of her head and in her down-bent 
glance and Tom wondered at it. But he was too 
happy to think much about anything but his own 
mounting joy. 

When dinner was over they went up on the 
bridge and Ted Renny got his guitar. Dusk had 
come early and it was cold with a bleak wind 
blowing from the southeast. Across the harbor 
the Loafalong was ablaze with lights but the 
Gleam showed only her riding lantern and the 
glow of Cousin Phoebe’s reading lamp in the 
cabin. Tom brought out rugs and they wrapped 
themselves up until they were muffled lumps in 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 269 

the darkness of the bridge. Under the big rug 
Tom held Emily’s hand close while Ted Renny 
sang. He was singing to-night to Frances who sat 
beside him on the bench by the windshield. 
Across the bridge Tom and Emily nestled close on 
a cushioned seat. Mr. Renny’s lyric tenor did 
very well with the McCormack type of song and 
to-night his songs were sentimental and sad. 
Emily protested: 

“ Oh, do stop those harrowing parting things, 
Teddy. We all know you’re leaving her for four 
days but why wring our hearts? You’re coming 
back.” 

“ And with oodles of money,” reminded Fran¬ 
ces. “ Sing something triumphant—sing that 
D’Hardelot thing. I love it.” 

Ted truck a chord. Then he hesitated. “ Em¬ 
ily’s contralto can do it better-” 

“No!” Emily’s voice came sharply out of the 
shadows. “ I don’t want to. Sing something 
else, Ted.” 

But Mr. Renny was pleasing Frances this even¬ 
ing. He went on with the accompaniment. 
Tom felt Emily stir uneasily as the phrases, in 
their beautiful slow measure, crept across the 
dark: 


270 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

"Because you came to me with naught save love, 
And hold my hand, and lift my eyes above, 

A wider world of hope and joy I see— 

Because you came to me.” 

Tom's hand under the rug gripped Emily's. 
His thrilled happiness, his outpouring conscious¬ 
ness of care for her, of protectiveness, held her still 
in the dark beside him. But the hand in his was 
cold as ice. 

"Because God made thee mine, I'll cherish thee, 

Through light and darkness, through all time to be, 

And pray His love to make our love divine . . .'' 

She got up suddenly, dropping the rug to the 
deck. “ I'm cold. I'm going in. Good-night, 
everybody.'' 

And not again that evening did Tom see her. 
Cousin Phoebe, when they shouted presently from 
the galley that a rarebit was under way, came to 
the swing door and warned them to be quiet. 
Emily was tired and had gone to bed, she told 
them. 

Tom, himself, did not expect to sleep a wink 
that night. He was too happy. He wanted to 
go over and over it—that moment under the 
cedars when he had seen the woqder in her eyes 
and had bent and kissed her. He wanted to hug 
to his heart the realization that always, always 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 271 


she was going to be his and that loneliness was 
gone from his life forever. 

But almost immediately he fell asleep, and he 
dreamed of Emily. They were together on the 
Vagabond with the night wind in their faces and 
far ahead was a light that flashed . . . one 
flash, four flashes, three flashes. The light of 
Minot. I — love—you it was flashing and Emily 
and he were watching it across wide seas. Then 
the dream changed: he was in a dark place and 
Emily was calling to him. Her voice was 
frightened. . . . 

He woke and found himself struggling to throw 
off his blanket. It had been no dream—she was 
calling to him. And her voice was frightened. 

“ Tom!—I want you.” 

He leaped from his bunk and thrust his head 
through the hatch. The strong east wind ruffled 
his hair. It was very dark but he could see Emily 
standing near the hatch, balancing on the un¬ 
steady deck. 

“ Tom, I want you. Can you get dressed and 
come up here? ” 

“ Of course, my dearest. What is it, Emily? ” 

“ I just want you. I—I'm afraid.” 

Her voice came quavering through the dark. 


272 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 
“ Be with you in five seconds. Go to the bridge, 
out of this wind.” 

He watched until she was safely on the bridge. 
The night was so black that but for an electric 
torch she carried he could not have seen her five 
feet away. Careful not to wake Ted Renny, he 
slipped into his clothes and drew on a heavy 
sweater. Then he caught up a blanket from his 
bunk and made his way to the bridge. The Gleam 
was rocking about, straining at her mooring. Not 
a star was in sight and on the easterly wind came 
the boom of heavy seas breaking on ledges to 
southward. Emily was crouching on the bench 
near the windshield. Tom lighted the binnacle 
lamp and in its dim glow he saw her face, white 
with dark eyes staring up at him. She had on 
the coral mandarin coat and its vivid color 
gleamed where the light struck it. 

He wrapped the blanket around her and felt 
her shivering under his hands. He tried to speak 
lightly: 

“ Now tell me what frightened you so. Do you 
know what time it is, you crazy child?—just went 
four bells—two o’clock in the morning.” 

“ I couldn’t sleep, Tom. I was afraid. I had 
to call you-” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 273 

“ Did you hear anybody prowling around? ” 

“ No,—I was just afraid.” 

“ But of what, dear? ” He sat beside her on 
the bench, arms tight around her. A shuddering 
breath shook her whole body. 

“ Emily! Tell Tom, dear.” 

“ Oh, I can’t—I can’t tell you.” 

He held her close but did not speak. And 
another long shudder went over her. 

“ Emily, you must tell me. How can I help 
you if I don’t know? ” 

She shook off the blanket and faced round on 
him. In the glimmer of the binnacle lamp he 
could see her coral coat and above it her white, 
strained face. 

“ Yes—I have to tell you. Tom, we can’t have 
each other. I—I—am—married.” 


CHAPTER XXIV 


He stared at her, eyes never leaving hers while 
the binnacle light and the Gleam , and lanterns 
on the anchored boats, and all his universe swung 
round in a dizzy whirl as though some horrible 
kaleidoscope were shifting the solid facts of his 
cosmos. When they settled back into place he 
seemed still clinging to her eyes. They looked 
back into his like eyes across some dreadful void. 
“ Did you say you were married, Emily? ” 

“ I—I don’t know. I think I am married, 
Tom.” 

He stood over her, hands clutching her shoul¬ 
ders. He felt her quiver under his touch. 
“ Either you are married or you are not married, 
Emily. I want to know what you mean.” 

She cowered away from him. “ How can I tell 

you when you frighten me so- 

He dropped his hands and turned away. Across 
the deck he stood by the rail, drawing in long 
breaths of the cold, salt air—as might one who 
was suffocating. A fog must be coming in, out- 
274 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 275 

side; the horn on Manana was beginning to wail 
dismally. Over on the Loajalong the riding light 
went up and down, up and down, then across in a 
long arc. Behind him he heard Emily's teeth 
chattering. He came back to her and drew the 
blanket around her again, carefully,—gently, 
tucking it in at her shoulders and over her little 
bare foot that had dropped its slipper. Then he 
stood, leaning against the wheel, arms folded and 
hands gripping his elbows. “ Now tell me," he 
said. 

She wanted to talk now, to explain, to justify 
herself. Her words tumbled along incoherently: 

“ His name is Randolph Geggie. He is forty- 
six. But he doesn’t seem old. He was so jolly 
and gay and kind to me. And I was so unhappy 
at Aunt Adeline’s. I hated Hannah and Martha 
so—and Percival. I couldn’t bear it. He said I 
could always live my kind of life if I married him. 
We would be young together—at the country club 
and with his car, and in a big house where my 
pals could come. And—and he loved my little 
Ming so much-’’ 

She was wringing her hands under the blanket. 

“ Go on," said Tom. 

“ I couldn’t bear it any longer in that house. 


276 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


I wanted to be free and gay and happy. So I 
said I would marry him-” 

“ When was all this? ” 

“Just this spring. The wedding was June 
eleventh. It was at our house. Aunt Adeline 
wouldn’t have it at any church but hers and I 
couldn’t stand that. So it was very quiet and 
Uncle started on his trip abroad right afterward. 
He drove away to get his New York train just 
before we left for the west-bound train. We 
were going to California ” 

“You never went?” Tom suddenly unfolded 
his arms and came nearer to her. 

“No. Something—something he said in the 
taxi frightened me. Oh, Tom, I was so fright¬ 
ened.” She stretched out her arms to him. He 
sat down beside her on the bench and pulled the 
blanket up about her again. “ Poor little Emily,” 
he whispered. 

She looked at him piteously. “ I knew you’d 
understand, Tom. I just couldn’t face it. I 
couldn’t go on with it. All of a sudden I realized 
what a dreadful, awful mistake I’d made. 
When we got to the railroad station and it was 
bright with lights and I looked at him—he was 
walking away from me to see about our luggage_ 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 277 

he looked like some stranger. And so old—old 
enough to be my father. I—I guess I had sort 
of a panic. I jumped up and ran out of the 
station and took a taxi to Phoebe’s apartment. I 
don’t know where he went.” 

“ You mean you never saw him again? ” He 
crushed her in his arms, blanket and all. Across 
the terrifying void she seemed to have come back 
to him. Then he put her from him gently. It 
was a long way between the afternoon’s happiness 
and this moment, a long, long way. 

“ Tell me the rest, dear,” he said. 

“ I stayed with Phoebe ten days. We sent for 
Frances. There had been some talk, she said, but 
no big fuss. No one was sure whether I was 
missing, or waiting somewhere for him. Then I 
thought of the yacht. Uncle had taken me to see 
it in April and I bought my wedding clothes in 
New York on the way back to Buffalo. I met 
the shipyard people then, so they knew me when 
I went to get the yacht in June. Phoebe had a 
position in Uncle’s office. He was away and she 
opened all the mail. She wrote on the firm paper 
to the shipyard people, telling them to put the 
yacht in commission and signed Uncle’s name. 


278 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


And of course she was there to get their reply 
when it came. Then she fell and hurt her arm 
and we had to wait another week. Tran came 
first—she is supposed to be staying with Cleveland 
friends while her parents are taking a trip to 
Bermuda. Then I came, and Phoebe came. I 
traveled to New York in Phoebe’s clothes. There 
were a lot of wedding-present checks. Phoebe 
cashed them for me—that’s how I got the money 
for the cruise. And—and you know the rest, 
Tom.” 

“ What you have feared is that he will follow 
you? ” 

“ I know he will. But I felt sure he’d never 
think of the yacht. He hates the water and never 
showed any interest in the yacht so I said little 
about it. Uncle and I kept it a sort of guilty 
secret between us. We were going to take the 
yacht through the canals to Buffalo and then 
spring it on Randolph and Aunt Adeline. I 
thought the yacht would be a place of my own 
where I could run away by myself when I 
wanted to.” 

She sat up and looked at Tom. (( I never in¬ 
tend to go back. But I had to think things out 
and hide somewhere and the yacht seemed a safe 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 279 


place. I knew if I could keep hidden till Uncle 
came home he’d do something-” 

“ Do something? ” 

“ Yes—to get me free.” 

Tom smiled sadly. “ I’m afraid that won’t be 
so easy, little Emily.” 

She leaned forward eagerly. “ But Frances 
says it’s not a real marriage—binding. That it 
can be annulled. Couldn’t it, Tom? ” 

“ If he is willing—perhaps. If he’s the right 
kind of chap—knowing how you feel about it—he 
may be willing. But suppose he is not willing, 
Emily? ” Tom didn’t believe any man would be 
willing, once given the right to possess her, to 
give her up. 

“ He won’t be,” she whispered, her hands wring¬ 
ing together again. “ He won’t be willing.” 

“ Well, that’s all we’ve got to hope for.” Tom’s 
voice had a weary flatness. He felt terribly tired. 
Too tired to stay there and talk another minute. 
He got to his feet slowly, like an old man. “ Do 
you know it’s three o’clock? You mu&t go to 
bed now. Come—I’m going to put out the 
lamp.” 

In the dark she drew close to him, pressing 
against him. “ Tom, you will find some way, 
won’t you? * 


280 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


“ I don’t know, Emily. I’ll try.” 

“ Tom, you must . I love you so. I want you 
so. You’ve got to find a way, Tom.” 

Pie disengaged the little clutching hands. “ I 
shall have to think, Emily. You must go to bed 
now.” He led her across the deck to the door of 
her cabin. At the top of the steps she turned 
and seized his hand. 

“ Tom, you love me, don’t you? Say so! I’m 
so afraid and it’s so dark-” 

“ Love you! ” He caught her to him. “ Emily, 
Emily,” he whispered, his lips against hers. 

Then he stumbled to the bow deck where he sat, 
back against the skylight, staring at the anchor 
lights, and then at the spectral boats as one by 
one they emerged, dim gray shapes on tossing 
gray water, as dawn crept over the hill of 
Monhegan. 


CHAPTER XXV 


Emily did not come out to breakfast and since 
the gangway from galley to aft cabin was through 
her sleeping quarters they had breakfast on the 
bridge with the canvas curtains drawn—a dismal 
meal. The rain held off but clouds hung low and 
threatening over a gray sea and the east wind 
moaned fitfully. 

Tom saw Emily embark with Ted in the tender 
when he went for the mail, but Mr. Renny re¬ 
turned alone. Emily had gone for a walk, he 
said. “ I told her it was going to pour but she 
wanted to see the surf on the cliffs.” Ted carried 
a telegram for Frances. It had come on the 
morning steamer. The captain had advised pas¬ 
sengers for the afternoon boat to wear oilskins; it 
was going to be dirty weather, crossing to the 
mainland to-day. Tom lent Mr. Renny his shiny 
suitcase since the green-painted box was obviously 
impossible for a jaunt to the metropolis, and the 
departing dramatist proposed to spend the morn¬ 
ing packing. 

Tom did not wait to see what Frances’ telegram 
281 


282 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


was about. He had to find Emily. She must be 
in desperate mood to fare forth alone in face of 
the coming storm. The tender was half-full of 
water after Ted’s trip ashore so he took the old 
dory they had rented in order to have, always, one 
boat tied at the steps. Emily was not on the 
Washerwoman ledges where a throng of people 
sat, hats tied down, watching the splendor and 
terror of the sea as it piled up before the south¬ 
easterly gale. 

And she was not on Whitehead. Or in their 
nook over beyond the lighthouse. Or on Squeaker 
Rock. Could it have been only yesterday that 
they had sat here and he had thought she looked 
like a wood-sprite in her white coat against the 
green of the cedars? He saw a moving speck out 
on Blackhead—a woman with skirts blowing in 
the wind. Somehow he got to Blackhead, he 
never remembered just how. When he came out 
on the high cliff he saw her standing at the very 
edge, gazing out to sea. She was holding her hat 
with both hands and the wind whipped her skirt 
straight backward. 

He dragged her away from the edge. “ What 
are you doing here? ” 

She stared at him, pulling away from his hand 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 283 


and rubbing her arm. “Tom, you hurt me! 
What made you grab me like that? You fright¬ 
ened me.” 

“ You frightened me.” 

She laughed unsteadily. “I wasn't contem¬ 
plating a jump—if that's what you were afraid of. 
Don't worry, I haven't courage enough for that. 
I haven’t courage enough for anything, I guess," 
she added forlornly. “ I was thinking about those 
anchors—and not being able to face the gale." 

They were walking back across the ledges, the 
wind behind them. She tucked her hand under 
his arm and looked up at him. “You're going 
to bring things right, aren't you, Tom? I'm just 
going to let you face things the way you said you 
would. You'll take care of me, won't you, Tom? 
And find a way? " 

He stopped when they came to a drop in the 
ledges where there was partial shelter from the 
wind. Against the gray rock she was all white; 
white coat, white hat, white face. Only her eyes 
burned darkly, fixed on him. 

“ Have you thought it out, Tom? ” 

He stood before her, eyes looking straight into 
hers. “ I thought till dawn. And I can only see 
one way, Emily: you've got to go back.” 


284 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


“ Go back! ” Faintly she echoed his words. 

“ I can’t see any other—honorable way. You 
say he’s a good man—kind. You married him of 
your own free will. Just because you have 
changed your mind you can’t take back your 
solemn promise—and throw his life into chaos. 
He hasn’t done anything unworthy. He loved 
you and asked you to marry him. And you 
did-” 

Her eyes flashed. “ I won’t go back. I won’t. 
Tom!—you pretend to love me and say that to 
me? Try to send me away from you—to mis¬ 
ery? ” 

He stared at the sea. He couldn’t see any other 
way. All through his night vigil had been with 
him the traditions of his New England heritage, 
and stern Scotch traditions that had come down 
to him from dead and gone MacLeods. To 
Tom promises were things to be kept, sacra¬ 
ments and covenants things not lightly to be set 
aside. 

" I can’t see any other way, Emily. If he is 
big enough—if he loves you enough to be big— 
after you have told him the truth he’ll find the 
way out for you. For us. But you owe it to him 
to go back. To face him like a woman and not 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 285 


sneak and hide. Don’t you see—don’t you see, 
Emily? ” 

She had sunk on a low rock and was crouching, 
her face in her hands. 

“ I can’t go back. Don’t ask me, Tom.” 

He bent over her and laid his hand very softly 
on her hair from which the white hat had fallen. 
“ I do ask you, Emily—for both our sakes. Do 
the brave thing! All the happiness you and I 
may have, God willing—if he is big enough, de¬ 
pends on your being big enough now.” 

“ I can’t.” She shuddered. Then she looked up 
at him. “ Suppose he isn’t big enough. Suppose 
he tries to hold me. Can he? It wasn’t a real 
marriage, Frances said so.” 

He knelt in front of her and held her hands. 
“ Listen, Emily: suppose you and I had been 
engaged and I had been hurt—was at death’s 
door. And the only way you could be with me 
and take care of me was to be married to me. 
And suppose, beside my sick-bed, a minister said 
the words over us. Wouldn’t you consider your¬ 
self my wife? ” 

“ Yes—I would.” 

“ Of course you would. Well then, why aren’t 
you married to him? Marriage is a vow, a prom- 


286 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


ise in the sight of God. Whatever loopholes the 
law may afford, a vow is a binding thing. You 
are married to this Randolph Geggie and you’ve 
got to go back to him. That’s all I can see. His 
generosity may set you free, perhaps, by making 
use of the human laws, but I can’t see—I can’t 
see, Emily, that there is anything for you to do 
now but to go back.” 

She rose and looked at him drearily. 

“ Then it’s all over,” she said. 

“ I don’t know.” He threw out his hands in a 
sudden despairing gesture. “ I only know it’s as 
far as I can see.” 

They walked back in silence, bending against 
the wind. She had to hold her hat down and 
never glanced at him once. As they came down 
the road to the wharf Tom saw a new yacht an¬ 
chored beyond the Loaf along. Even in his tor¬ 
tured abstraction his eye took note of its trim 
lines; an express cruiser, he thought, come in to 
ride out the sou’easter. 

As they rowed across to the Gleam , the dory 
bouncing on choppy seas, Tom spoke suddenly. 
“ I can’t stay on board, you know.” She nodded. 
“ After the storm I’ll take you to Portland and you 
can leave the yacht at the shipyard.” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 287 


On the Gleam they found confusion and excite¬ 
ment. Frances’ telegram had been from the 
Cleveland friend. Her father had wired from 
New York that her mother was ill and they had 
returned on an earlier boat. Frances was to go at 
once to Buffalo to make the house ready for them. 
This telegram, opened by the friend with whom 
Frances was supposed to be staying, had made 
necessary a message to Monhegan. There was 
no time to be lost and Frances was packing furi¬ 
ously. She would take the afternoon boat with 
Ted Renny and get the sleeper that night from 
Portland. It was not likely that she would come 
back to the Gleam and if she could not come Mr. 
Renny would not. He was going through to Buf¬ 
falo with her. Tom looked wistfully at Ted 
Renny; everything was clear and bright ahead for 
his love affair. No parents could object seriously 
to blithe Mr. Renny with the solid bulwark of 
the pickle business behind him. 

Not a word of her own trouble did Emily speak 
to Frances. Tom saw her helping Frances pack, 
listening to outpoured plans and anxious fears 
about the sick mother. When the two girls 
hugged each other on deck while Tom and Ted 


288 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

waited in the tender, Emily replied brightly to 
Frances’ remorseful protest about leaving her. 

“ Don’t worry about me, Frannie. You’ve 
been wonderful this summer. Tom will take the 
Gleam to Portland and then Phoebe and I will 
board somewhere. I’ll write you.” She stood 
at the rail gallantly waving until the tender 
reached the wharf where the little steamer was 
waiting. 

Tom could not go back to the Gleam . He must 
walk. Buffet the wind. Tramp until physical 
weariness dulled the misery in his heart. He 
turned up his sweater collar and set off on the long 
hike to Pulpit Pock. He never remembered what 
he had seen or what he had thought of on that 
tramp in which a gray world of tossing seas, lash¬ 
ing tree branches and bending grasses swam be¬ 
fore his sick eyes. He was buffeting wind and 
fighting pain—that was all he recollected of the 
afternoon. The rain came and deluged him but 
he did not care. Through its driving slant, as he 
approached the wharf, he saw the tossing yachts 
in the harbor. Most of them showed lighted win¬ 
dows though it was not dusk yet by the clock. 
The new yacht over by the Loajalong was brilliant 
with lights. Somebody had said it was the 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 289 

Marcia, chartered by a rich westerner for a Maine 
cruise. . . . 

Suddenly to Tom came a premonition. 

That new boat—whose was it? Why was it 
here? Had Doris Twombly really meant some¬ 
thing by her signal? Had she been trying to 
convey a friendly warning? 

Tom’s dory cut through the climbing seas. 
The Gleam showed not a single light. With a 
sick sense of certainty Tom leaped up the steps, 
down past the deck house, pounded on the door of 
the cabin. 

No answer. Not even Ming’s welcoming growl. 

He flung open the door. The cabin was empty 
and all about were signs of hurried departure. 

Almost immediately he saw the note placed 
conspicuously on the table. The light from the 
swinging lamp fell on the white paper with its 
penciled message. He caught it up. 

“I have gone with Randolph on the Marcia. He 
has been here with Percy. I hope you are satisfied 
now. 

“Phoebe will be with me. It’s part of the bargain 
I made, and nothing is to be decided until we get to 
Buffalo and talk with Uncle. Will you take the Gleam 
to Portland for me as you promised? Good-bye. 
Emily.” 

I hope you are satisfied. The words leaped out 


290 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

of the letter and cut at him. He sat on one of the 
transoms, the letter in his hand, and stared at the 
rug. I hope you are satisfied . But what else 
could he have done? What else was there to be 
done? 

After a time he got up and went to the engine 
room to light the anchor lantern. Out on deck 
the storm was sweeping across the dusk, sheets of 
rain driving before the southeasterly gale. 
Through the rain he saw the Marcia, light pouring 
from all her cabin windows. 

Emily was there, having dinner. 

He went down to the galley and cooked some 
food for himself. But he could not eat. He 
pushed the food from him and went on deck again. 
The boats were grinding against the step, the 
Gleam's tender and the rented dory. He hoisted 
the dainty tender to the davits out of harm's way. 
Then he slipped on his oilskins and got into the 
dory. He rowed across the harbor to the Marcia. 
It took tremendous effort to keep the dory's bow 
up, in that wind. Bain slashed at his face and 
seas came over the dory's side until his feet were 
in a pool of water. Three times he rowed around 
the Marcia, looking up at the lighted windows, 
listening for voices. But he saw nothing but the 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 291 


light, streaming yellow through the rain; and wind 
and sea made too much noise for any sound inside 
the yacht to reach him. In all Tom's life there 
would come no moment of more poignant loneli¬ 
ness than was his, this night, out on the storm- 
tossed harbor, the rain slashing at his face, lifted 
to the lighted windows of Randolph Geggie's 
yacht. 

And there was nothing he could do. I hope 
you are satisfied. Well, she would come to see 
that there was nothing else he could have done— 
nothing else for herself to do but to go back and 
face her responsibility- 

But she had not gone—he had sent her. And 
she hoped he was satisfied! That night when 
they had stood at the Gleam's wheel steering by 
the lights, she had told him he made her feel 
protected. How could he protect her, now, better 
than by sending her back to the man who had first 
right to take care of her? 

He tied the tender and went up the steps 
wearily. Suddenly he longed for Celia. Oh, to 
open the cabin door and find Celia sitting at her 
little desk; to see her jump up in the old glad 
way and cry out to him: “ Here's my boy back 
again.” 


292 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


He could get Celia’s message anyway—no fear 
of interruption now. He lighted the cabin lamp 
and got to work on the panel. It took very little 
time to loosen the screws that held it to the wood¬ 
work. In the narrow space behind he discovered 
only a thick envelope addressed to him in Celia’s 
handwriting. In his careful way, before reading 
the message, he fitted the panel back in place, 
slipping the envelope into an inside pocket of his 
coat. He was tightening the last screw when he 
stood rigidly still, listening. 

Above the clamor of the storm he had heard 
Emily’s voice, calling to him. 


CHAPTER XXVI 


He dashed out to the cockpit and around by the 
deck house. Emily was holding a rowboat near 
the steps, afraid to come close in the heavy seas. 
Tom ran down the steps, water rising above his 
knees as the Gleam rolled. He caught the bow 
of the rowboat, drew it in and in a moment had 
lifted Emily up beside him. 

In the cabin she flung off her streaming slicker. 
“ They were ashore. I had to leave Ming. I 
took the other boat-” 

“ You rowed over here, through that storm— 
alone? Were you mad? You might have been 
drowned.” 

She shrugged her shoulders. “ Well, it wouldn’t 
matter much, would it?” 

“ But what happened? ” He stood staring at 
her, his face white as hers. Their young eyes held 
in a strained gaze. 

“ Phoebe’s hurt. She went ashore with Ran¬ 
dolph for something and slipped on the wharf. 
She sprained her ankle—badly. He took her to 
the hotel. She can’t be moved to the Marcia. 
Percy is going to stay with her. . . . Tom—I 
293 


294 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


can’t stay on that boat without Phoebe. The min¬ 
ute she was gone everything was different. He— 
oh, Tom, he is not good and kind any more. He 
is angry, fearfully angry. He talked—Tom, he’s 
going to take me with him on the Marcia . He 
wouldn’t let me go ashore to Phoebe. He threat¬ 
ened to lock me in the cabin. But there was no 
key so he couldn’t. The man took him ashore 

and I rowed over here-” 

She came close to him, hands clutched against 
her breast. “ Tom, take me away! ” 

“ Take—you—away? ” 

“ Yes, now—before he gets back and misses 
me.” 

“ But take you where, Emily? ” 

“ Oh, anywhere! What does it matter? I 
won’t stay on that boat alone with him. I’ll jump 
into the sea first.” 

“ But, my dear girl, to-night? In this storm? ” 
“ What does the storm matter? You’ve got to 
take me, Tom. If you have a spark of love for 
me you’ll take me—now, before he comes back 
from shore.” 

Young Tom passed his hand in a bewildered 
way across his hair. “ But Emily, if we go to¬ 
gether -” 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 295 


She glared at him, furious contempt in her eyes. 
“ If you haven't courage," she flung at him, “ you 
can say afterward it was my yacht and you were 
my employee and I ordered you-" 

“ I am not your employee! " he retorted hotly. 
“ I love you—you know that, Emily. And you 
know very well it is not the storm that makes me 
afraid." 

Suddenly she fell, a crumpled heap beside the 
transom and began to cry. He had never seen a 
woman cry like that,—horribly, terribly, great 
sobs racking her slender body as she crouched, 
face hidden in her hands, on the rug. He spoke 
to her but she would not look up or stop crying. 
Her sobs filled the cabin—the night—the world; 
tore at the heart of him. 

He gazed down at her, biting his lips to still 
their trembling as she crouched, sobbing, at his 
feet. 

He stooped and touched her shoulder. 

“ All right, Emily. We’ll go." 

The Gleam crept around the rocks at the harbor 
entrance and out into the storm-wracked night. 
The steady throb of her engine bade defiance to 
seas that tossed her about like a cockle-shell and 
to wind that screamed like some pouncing thing. 


296 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Tom in his oilskins gripped the wheel. The 
binnacle lamp showed his face grim, with tight-set 
lips as he peered through the rain-slashed wind¬ 
shield. They were running without lights and 
Emily had switched off the cabin lamps so that 
moving lighted windows should not betray their 
passage out of harbor. He knew she was down 
there in the dark now, perhaps still crouching by 
the transom. But the terrible sobbing must have 
ceased. The gale continually shoved him off his 
course which he was trying to keep well to the 
south, in open water and away from islands and 
ledges near the mainland. He could not see 
Pemaquid Light through the rain but he thought 
he ought shortly to pick up Seguin, and from 
Seguin he would be able to see the Halfway Rock 
flash outside Portland harbor. 

The door of the cabin opened and Emily came 
out in her oilskins. She stood beside him, facing 
the dark ahead, and neither spoke. When Seguin 
Light appeared out of the blackness she whispered, 

“ Where are you taking us, Tom? ” 

“ God knows,” he muttered. “ On the rocks, I 
reckon, Emily.” 

She drew close to him and laid her cheek against 
the wet sleeve of his slicker. 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 297 

“No. I trust you, Tom. You won’t take me on 
the rocks.” 

He looked down at her and the hard line left 
his lips and tenderness came into his eyes. 

“ No—never that, little Emily. You know it.” 

Then he told her he was taking her to his Aunt 
Judith in Newburgh. They could get a train from 
Portland in the morning and be at Newburgh by 
night. “ Then when I have left you with Aunt 
Judith-” 

She protested. He wasn’t going to leave her 
alone in Newburgh—with a strange woman! She 
wouldn’t go. 

“ You will go,” Tom told her firmly. “ You’ve 
asked me to take care of you and I’m going to do 
it. You’ve tried to manage your own life your 
own way—and made a mess of things. Somebody 
else is going to manage it now. You’ll be safe 
with Aunt Judith-” 

“ But what will you do? ” 

“ I shall go to see him.” 

“Him? You mean . . . Randolph?” She 
looked frightened. “ Can’t he—can’t he make a 
good deal of trouble for you, Tom? ” 

“ I dare say.” The MacLeod jaw had a set look. 
“ But I am going. And to see your uncle too. 


298 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


You leave it to me, Emily. It’s out of your hands 
now. Don't you think you better go down to 
your cabin and get some sleep? ” 

But she would not leave him. For a long time 
they stood silent, the rain, sweeping in almost 
horizontal sheets across the bridge, drenching their 
oilskins. Seguin Light gleamed clear now, ahead, 
and Tom was searching anxiously for the beacon 
he knew ought to be somewhere near, on Bantam 
Rock. It was increasingly difficult to keep the 
yacht on her course. She edged continually to 
leeward and Tom wondered if anything might be 
wrong with his steering gear. 

Even as he wondered the wheel behaved in an 
astonishing way under his hands and below his 
feet the engine went racing. 

He dashed down the ladder and up again. In 
the partial stillness that followed the stopping of 
the engine Emily's voice came sharply, “ What 
is it? " 

“ The propeller—it's gone. I'm going to sink 
the lead. If there's bottom under us I can drop 
the anchor-" 

But he had no time for the lead. There was a 
crash, a sickening cant of the deck on which they 
stood and water began pouring in over the lee 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 299 

rail. A great sea, white-crested, curved above the 
weather side and carried Tom and Emily with it. 
In a second they were struggling in the water. 


CHAPTER XXVII 


Tom grabbed for Emily as he felt himself flung 
across the rail. He caught at her sleeve and drew 
her to him and began to swim, terribly hampered 
by his oilskins. 

Almost immediately he found his feet on bot¬ 
tom and surf was breaking around him. He 
dragged Emily up out of the pounding waves and 
put her on her feet. They were on a gravelly 
beach and behind them he thought were dense 
woods. The southeast gale had sent the yacht, 
helpless without her steering gear, broadside on 
this beach, and thirty feet from where they stood 
she was lying on her side, harried by the waves. 

Tom thought very rapidly. It was, he knew, 
about flood tide and unless he could fasten the 
yacht in some way she would be carried out on 
the receding tide and lost, for undoubtedly in that 
smash some of her seams would have opened and 
she would sink in deep water. Unless the storm 
held for another twelve hours no succeeding tide 

was likely to be as high as this one, so if he could 
300 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 301 


only keep the yacht from going out to deep water 
there was good chance of saving her. He must 
save the old Vagabond! 

He flung off his oilskins and his shoes and 
plunged into the surf. The bow of the yacht 
seemed to be well out of water but waves were 
washing over the deck house and the tender was 
smashed to bits. He fastened the anchor hawser 
securely at the bow and carrying the hawser 
ashore snubbed it around a tree at the edge of the 
wood and made the slack fast to another tree. 
The yacht lifted on a giant roller and the hawser 
strained—but it held. 

Then he went out through the surf again and 
climbing aboard, made his way into the crew’s 
cubby. Everything in there seemed to be fairly 
dry and he brought back several blankets, holding 
them high above his head as he waded ashore. 
The tide was falling already, he noticed. He 
made Emily sit on the sand and wrapped the 
blankets about her. Then he made another trip 
to the yacht and foraged in the crew’s cubby for 
firewood. The rain had ceased but of course no 
dry wood was to be had on shore. He carried 
Mr. Renny’s green-painted box to the beach and 
also several of the locker drawers, and what papers 


302 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

and magazines he could find. With his wood from 
the crew’s cubby he managed to make a fairly 
good fire. He wished he could get something hot 
for Emily to drink, but the galley, with the rest 
of the deck house, was hopelessly flooded. 

He had salvaged his pipe and tobacco from the 
crew’s cubby, and some cigarettes of Ted’s which 
he offered, as forlorn substitute for food-comfort, 
to Emily. 

But she shook her head—and then suddenly 
smiled up at him in the firelight. “You know 
very well I never smoked the horrid things except 
when I wanted to torment you. Do you believe 
I could possibly want to do that now, Tom, when 
I can only think how wonderful you are to me? ” 

He realized that it was almost the first time 
she had spoken since their plunge into the sea. 
Some women would have whimpered—complained 
bitterly about the cold and discomfort, or would 
have chattered, asking hysteric questions about 
possibilities of rescue. She had said almost noth¬ 
ing, doing what he told her to, helping all she 
could. The game little thing! In spite of his chill 
and wetness and worry Tom MacLeod knew he 
was a lot happier this minute, stranded and ship¬ 
wrecked, taking care of her, than he would have 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 303 

been, safe in harbor, alone on the Gleam with his 
misery. 

He made her promise to sit still by the fire and 
taking his torch went off to investigate their 
whereabouts. He was gone only twenty minutes 
and told her they were on an island, thickly 
wooded and some distance from the mainland. 
He had discovered two ancient bungalows, both 
recently vacated. Probably the people had fled 
before the coming sou’easter. There would be 
shelter in one of the bungalows, he said, and they 
could have a fire to dry their clothes, but it 
seemed better to stay where they could see passing 
boats. Dawn could not be far away and he was 
going to rig up some sort of distress signal. 

Just before daylight they glimpsed the lights of 
a vessel coming up from the eastward. Tom knew 
the lights were those of a yacht and wondered if 
it might be the Marcia. He was down by the 
water’s edge rigging up his signal. The tide had 
fallen considerably now and the poor old Gleam 
looked very forlorn, lying on her side on the sand 
with water running out of her seams. 

Emily, chin on hands, huddled under her 
blankets and stared into the dying fire and out 
over the gray sea. A cold saffron streak in the 


304 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

east foretold the dawn. Birds were stirring in the 
wood behind her. Dimly she could see Tom mov¬ 
ing about down by the water's edge. How tired 
he must be, poor Tom,—and wet and chilled in 
the bleak wind in his wet clothes. He was tak¬ 
ing care of her. But at what cost, perhaps, to 
himself! She knew very well what he was likely 
to bring upon himself by this mad runaway 
escapade. 

And he had come with her against his will—be¬ 
cause he loved her. Because he could not stand 
her terrified weeping. Where was she taking him? 
Not only had she dragged her own anchor, facing 
her gale, but she had made him drag his. And 
now both of them were adrift. Tom had tried to 
keep his anchor fast and he had tried to show her 
the lights so that her own little craft could keep 
clear of the rocks. 

But she had no anchor like Tom's—nothing but 
her own will that was completely self-centered. 
Never had her anchor mattered to her. So long 
as the sea was blue and the sun shone her gay 
little barque had danced on the spindrift with no 
worry about what was below: firm-holding granite 
or shifting, unstable sand. When one harbor 
hadn't pleased her she had sought another. Sun- 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 305 

shine and blue seas she’d had to have. The least 
hint of storm had dismayed her . . . because 
she knew she had nothing steadfast wherewith to 
meet the testing gale! 

Ships rejoicing in the breeze; 

Wrecks that drift on unknown seas, 

Anchors dragged in faithless sands . . 

She had come across that in the book of Long¬ 
fellow’s poems that she and Frances had been 
reading since their visit to the Longfellow house 
in Portland, and the lines had stuck in her 
memory. 

Now she and Tom were adrift on unknown seas 
because her inadequate anchor had been dropped 
in the faithless sands of her own desires. Tom’s 
anchor would have held steady and sure had not 
her cowardly challenge to his love for her made 
him, too, go adrift. 

He was coming to her across the beach in the 
chill light of the new day and in his white, tired 
face his gray eyes were smiling at her. His hand 
closed over hers and together they gazed out at the 
sea. 

“ I love you,” he said. “ We’ll find a way some¬ 
how, Emily.” 

Their rescuer was a fishing schooner bound for 


306 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Portland with a cargo of lobsters. It came along 
at five o'clock. The kindly skipper turned over 
his tiny cabin to Emily and ordered her to get 
between the blankets; and he carried her clothes 
himself to the galley to be dried over the stove. 
Tom was outfitted with a pair of baggy breeches 
and a flannel shirt and was served a hot break¬ 
fast that put new heart into him. Emily did not 
eome on deck until they were rounding Portland 
breakwater. Beside Tom, near the mast, she 
watched the wharves and the city drawing nearer. 
The sun was shining and everything had a wind¬ 
swept, rain-washed cleanness after the storm. 

Both of them saw the Marcia , lying at anchor 
in the harbor, but neither mentioned it to the 
other. 


CHAPTER XXVIII 


Having secured a room for Emily at one of the 
Portland hotels, Tom urged her to go at once to 
bed and sleep as long as she could. He ordered a 
substantial breakfast sent up to her and then set 
about his business. He had a great deal to do. 
He must buy suitable clothes for traveling, secure 
reservations on the evening train for New York, 
get a shave, send a long telegram to Aunt Judith 
and make arrangements with the shipyard people 
to have the Gleam patched up and towed into 
Portland. 

Since he had to supply himself with everything 
from hat to shoes it was considerably after twelve 
when he went up to his room to effect a change of 
costume. As he slung yesterday’s shapeless coat 
over a chair something fell to the floor. Celia's 
letter!—he had never thought of it since slipping 
it into his pocket last night just before Emily 
called to him. 

The envelope was badly water-soaked and also 
its contents. There were several typewritten 
enclosures, memoranda relating to some banking 

307 


308 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

matter. And a letter from Celia, the ink blurred 
but Celia’s beautiful writing still legible. The 
letter was not long and Tom read it before exam¬ 
ining the other papers. 

“Tom: —I have left you forty thousand dol¬ 
lars which Cliff knows nothing about. It is 
deposited in a bank at Newburgh as a trust fund 
for Aunt Judith Wilson. She lives on the interest 
only, and later the principal will be yours. If at 
any time you should be in want Aunt Judith will 
turn over her interest to you, but in that case you 
must take care of her. 

“As you know, little ‘Aunt Judith ’ as you call 
her was my girlhood friend. Cliff has always been 
jealous of our devotion and disapproves of the way 
she is living—hidden away from her husband all 
these years. But I have sided with Judith and 
helped her, and I cannot go, leaving her in want 
and unprotected. As long as she has a penny to 
her name that man will hound her—if he can find 
her. He always turned up when his funds were 
low and for years she supported him, taking in 
sewing. For the last five years she has lived in 
Newburgh as ‘ Mrs. Clark ’ and has been contented 
and happy. He must not find her. Her sister 
in California has kept track of him and according 
to last accounts he has obtained money somehow 
and is living in great style as a bachelor clubman 
in Buffalo. He has dropped the Wilson and uses 
only his first name, Randolph Geggie. . . .” 

Tom leaped to his feet. 

Randolph Geggie Wilson. Aunt Judith’s Ran 






























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She Looked Forlornly Over the Sea 














LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 309 
Wilson whom he had so often heard discussed by 
Cliff and Celia. Posing as a clubman in Buffalo. 
Trying to catch a rich girl. . . . 

Tryingt —oh, merciful heavens! 

Tom dragged on the new clothes somehow, tore 
out of his room and down to the desk and asked 
that Miss Brown be sent for at once. (He had 
registered as Thomas Brown and sister.) He was 
informed by the clerk that Miss Brown had gone 
out some time ago but had left a note. He 
handed it to Tom, who read it standing by the 
desk. 

“ Tom dear, I have gone to the Marcia . I saw 
her in the harbor this morning. And this time I 
am not coming back. I thought it all out last 
night on that island. My dear, I can't let you 
drag your anchor because I am afraid to face my 
gale. You have been right all the way and I 
have only been cowardly. You have showed me 
how to steer by the Lights and I am going to try. 

“ Emily." 

He flung himself in a taxi, but when he reached 
the wharf there was no sign of the Marcia. Some¬ 
one on the wharf told him the yacht had gone 
out an hour ago, headed southward. 

Tom got into the taxi and was driven back to 
the hotel. What to do now? How could he catch 


310 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 


the yacht? Would Geggie go straight on to Bos¬ 
ton or would he put in at some port along the 
way? And without a fast speedboat how could 
the Marcia be trailed and overtaken? Tom’s head 
felt confused and he could not think. He had 
had no sleep last night and very little the night 
before, and he had been under devastating emo¬ 
tional strain for thirty-six hours. 

There was his bill at the hotel to pay—that was 
the next thing. Maybe after that he could think, 
up in the quiet of his room. 

As he entered the hotel lounge two elderly gen¬ 
tlemen talking together looked up and one of them 
rose and came toward Tom. It was old Malcolm 
Avery. 

He was on a little vacation, he told Tom. Had 
been wanting a breath of Maine air, and as he 
had some important news for young Tom Mac¬ 
Leod, thought he’d take a run over to Monhegan 
where he knew Tom was staying. A Mrs. Judith 
Clark up in Newburgh had died suddenly, he said, 
and the trust company up there had communi¬ 
cated with him. They had been given his ad¬ 
dress by Celia MacLeod and they had a large sum 
of money, deposited by her, to hand over now to 
her son if he could be located- 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 311 

“But she wasn’t dead in June! ” young Tom 
was mumbling and the old lawyer looked hard at 
him. What was the matter with the lad? He 
looked all-in. Tom was staring over the lawyer’s 
shoulder at the other elderly gentleman who in 
turn was staring hard at Tom. Mr. Avery turned. 
“ That’s the man who got your Vagabond he 
mentioned. “ Raymond Brewster of Buffalo. 
He’s considerably upset about his niece who is on 
the boat, he thinks, up this way.” 

Tom strode across the lounge. 

“ You are Mr. Brewster. I remember you, sir. 
I am Tom MacLeod. You visited my father once 
on the Vagabond ” 

“ To be sure I did—and I remember you, too. 
So you are Cliff MacLeod’s boy, eh? ” Raymond 
Brewster put out a cordial hand. 

Mr. Avery had come up. “ See here, Brewster, 
young Tom has just come over from Monhegan. 
He might have seen the boat you are looking 
for.” 

Raymond Brewster turned eagerly. “ Did you 
happen to see the yacht—I believe now she’s 
called the Gleam -” 

“ I’m just off her,” said young Tom MacLeod. 
“I think,” he added, looking Emily’s uncle 


312 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

straight in the eyes, “ you and I have something 
to say to each other.” 

It was a long talk and nobody was more inter¬ 
ested in the astonishing information bandied back 
and forth than old Malcolm Avery who sat spell¬ 
bound during the recital. 

Mr. Brewster had come post haste to Portland 
and had wired Randolph Geggie to meet him 
there. Geggie had started on his cruise before 
Raymond Brewster had arrived home from 
Europe, but had written Emily’s uncle from Bos¬ 
ton that he had traced Emily to a yacht called 
the Gleam —through information furnished by 
some people who had picked up Phoebe Hage- 
boom’s eye-glass case. 

Three days ago had come a telegram saying that 
Geggie had located the Gleam at Monhegan 
Island and was going there at once. 

And two days ago Raymond Brewster had dis¬ 
covered that Randolph Geggie was in financial 
difficulties and in debt; and that he had even 
borrowed the money of Percival to finance this 
expedition on the Marcia . Instantly Raymond 
Brewster had suspected that Geggie had delib¬ 
erately played for Emily’s fortune—not a large 
one but sufficient to tempt a man with no income 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 313 

and deeply in debt. He had never wanted Emily 
to marry Geggie and had done all he could to 
dissuade her. 

And then, yesterday morning had come the 
final and worst piece of news. 

A woman who had traveled all the way from 
California had appeared at Mr. Brewster’s home 
and told an amazing story. Randolph Geggie, 
she claimed, was the husband of her sister Judith, 
who had just died in Newburgh. The frightened 
woman had seen a newspaper notice of Ran’s mar¬ 
riage to a Buffalo girl, and in the same paper a 
paragraph about the immediate separation of the 
couple for some unknown reason. The woman had 
come at once to Buffalo. The girl, she felt sure, 
must have discovered that Randolph had a wife 
living and that though the matter had been 
hushed up the couple had separated. 

Her confession exonerated Geggie in regard to 
the marriage. He had every reason to believe 
himself a widower. For after Celia MacLeod 
died timid little Judith Wilson, terrified at the 
thought of Randolph Geggie’s probable return to 
claim the money Celia had provided her with, had 
persuaded her sister to insert a false notice of 
Judith Wilson’s death in a California newspaper 


314 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

and to send the notice to Randolph Geggie to¬ 
gether with a brief letter informing him that 
“ sister Judith has gone.” 

The woman was almost idiotic with terror at 
what she might have been responsible for, Mr. 
Brewster said; and her relief was great at dis¬ 
covering that the girl who had gone through a 
marriage ceremony with Geggie had never laid 
eyes on him since. Raymond Brewster had 
started at once for Maine, wiring Geggie at Mon- 
hegan to meet him in Portland before attempting 
any interview with Emily, and implying very seri¬ 
ous reasons for the command. 

“ Whether he got my telegram I don’t know. 
But I know he was here early this morning. He 
registered here somewhere about ten o’clock. He 
told the clerk he was sending his yacht on ahead 
and would go to Boston by train. He spent half 
an hour at the telephone making inquiries of va¬ 
rious yacht clubs about some boat he seemed anx¬ 
ious to locate—the Gleam of course! While he 
was ’phoning a fellow brought in a message for 
him. Geggie seemed much excited. He asked 
the clerk to get him a fast motor-car to take him 
to Marblehead.” 

Then it was that old Malcolm Avery uttered the 


LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 315 

remark that made young Tom MacLeod his friend 
for life. 

“ Very well,” remarked Malcolm Avery, “ I sup¬ 
pose there are others who can hire a fast car too! ” 

It was a memorable trip, that race from Port¬ 
land to Marblehead. But by the time they slipped 
into old Marblehead, just as the sun was setting, 
Mr. Raymond Brewster knew a good deal about 
Cliff MacLeod’s boy—and liked what he knew. 
Liked it so well that as they stood in the corridor 
of the New Fountain Inn (where they found Ran¬ 
dolph Geggie’s name on the register) Emily’s 
uncle put his hand on the young man’s shoulder. 

“ Tom, my boy, you go out to that yacht and 
fetch Emily. Geggie’s in his room; he only ar¬ 
rived half an hour ago. Avery and I will talk 
to him. There is no reason why she should see 
him—or you either.” 

Tom rowed across a harbor deep rose under the 
afterglow of sunset. Anchor lights were twin¬ 
kling out on the yachts. A little silver shallop of 
a moon rode low in the west. The Marcia was 
lying almost where the Gleam had anchored. No 
tender was tied alongside and Tom supposed the 
skipper had rowed ashore to meet Randolph 
Geggie. He saw Emily sitting by the rail with 


316 LIGHTS ALONG THE LEDGES 

Ming in her arms. She was wrapped in the white 
woolly coat and her eyes were very sad as she 
looked off across the water. She did not see Tom 
until he had clambered aboard and stood beside 
her on the after deck. Then she sprang up, star¬ 
ing at him with wide eyes. 

He took her in his arms and told her. 

The telling took a long time. The rose light 
faded and the little silver moon sank out of sight. 
Came blue twilight—and dusk—and dark. Ming 
went to sleep again while the two he loved most 
sat close together on a seat by the rail. Vagabond, 
or Gleam, or Marcia , it was all the same to Ming. 
So long as his own were beside him, his world was 
perfect. 

Off to southward gleamed a light, jewel-bright 
against the dark. One flash, four flashes, three 
flashes. The light of Minot. 

“ Our light, Tom,” Emily whispered. “ The 
first light you showed me—do you remember? 
We’re going to steer by it, and it will take us 
safe-” 

“ Home,” finished young Tom. And kissed her. 


THE END 
































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